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The AH Coffee Shop and Reading Room 09

And on the twelfth day of Christmas, I received two more cards from my American family (to add to four others which all arrived after Christmas). At least I can still say they arrived for Christmas!

Decorations are mainly down but the tree won't be collected until Saturday so I'll keep it until then.
 
Our tree is still up. We usually have family over to take it down on New Years Day or the weekend thereafter, and we didn't do that this year. It's an artificial tree, so at least it isn't a fire hazard. I think it'll fall to me to take it down, and I have a limited concept of where all those ornaments go.
 
Deep breaths, deep breaths.

I just uploaded the last of the regular chapters in the Barstow series, 47 in all. I expect it will go live on Thursday morning. As mentioned in "The End..." thread, I have an epilogue in the works, so I'm not completely done yet. However, it's going to be really tough to let go of these characters and their lives. I will miss them. Maybe in some alternate dimension they will miss me.
 
My muse told me to write some drivel, even though my epic is still shelved.
 
It's cloudy and windy but in the 40s with highs in the 50s expected along with some rain. What wonderful birthday weather! I've completed my 72nd trip around the sun with more (hopefully) to come.

There's a fresh pot of coffee brewing and the teapot is boiling. There are donuts on the counter and I see that several people have left their tributes of chocolate for me. Many thanks! Someone left some buckeyes and I want to kiss them. Nothing goes better with chocolate than peanut butter and buckeyes are the bee's knees.

I'll be over in the corner pretending to work on my story while refreshing my control panel to see how my new story is doing. I got some writing done yesterday and hopefully will get the intro done sometime today.
 
Happy Birthday, @Candy_Kane54!

You wanted chocolate, so here it is. Open the package to find 72 virtual ghirardelli squares.

ghirardelli.jpg

Okay, so two 5-lb packages came up to 78 squares, so I snitched six. But it's ok. They're virtual, and in their place I hid an equally virtual gift card good for nine boxes (72 packets) of Starbucks Classic cocoa mix.

starbucks.jpg

You'll have to get into the chocolate before you can find the gift card, but that should work up a thirst.

Oh, and you'll need 9 virtual cartons of milk to make the cocoa, but I'm sure your imagination is up to that.
 
Well ain't that a kick. Ran across a news item today, from a couple of weeks ago, where a formal study had found that chocolate contains a compound, theobromine, that seems to have an anti-aging effect. People with higher levels in their blood tended towards reduction in biological age, and reduced fragmentation of DNA (cell breakdown). There's more theobromine in dark chocolate, too.

That's the second time fairly recently with reports about (especially) dark chocolate having positive health benefits. This from a Harvard study; T2D is Type 2 Diabetes:
The study found that participants who consumed at least five ounces of any type of chocolate per week had a 10% lower risk of T2D compared to those who never or rarely consumed chocolate. Dark chocolate had an even bigger impact: Participants who consumed at least five servings of this chocolate per week showed a 21% lower risk of T2D. The researchers also observed a 3% reduction in risk for every serving of dark chocolate consumed per week. Consumption of milk chocolate, meanwhile, was not associated with reduced T2D risk. Increased consumption of milk chocolate, but not dark chocolate, was associated with long-term weight gain, a potential contributor to the development of T2D.
Click to expand...

Elsewhere in the study defined "dark chocolate" as >70% cacao. So, CK, enjoy that bag of Ghirardelli 72% more than you would think!
 
Another cloudy morning but sunshine is expected this afternoon. Saw the doctor this morning and he's unhappy with me for not taking my cholesterol medicine (the side effects are horrible) and is looking to find a different one for me to try. However he's happy with my blood pressure but won't let me start the Meloxicam again.

I've got a fresh pot of coffee brewing and the teapot is hot. There are donuts and leftover birthday cake on the counter. The Christmas decorations are all put away and, even though I shouldn't have, all of the chocolate has been consumed.

I'll be over in the corner working on my story. So far, the reception of my new story is good and I've picked up some new followers.
 
so, I'm having a bit of a crossroads moment, I think.

It's now been just over a year since the final act ( I believe ) of what was supposed to be the last relationship I ever entered. I had placed so much of my belief in that area that I really don't know how to act now. My attempts at finding a new love to pursue have almost been instinct, perhaps because I feel that's what I'm SUPPOSED to do.

This isn't to say I'm not interested in finding a new relationship. But I think perhaps I recognize now, as I always have a little bit, that a large part of my moving from one woman to another has always been as much because I was in love with Being In Love as I was with the women who were captured within my selfishness. I don't necessarily think that is totally a bad thing. I have accomplished some good in the world... there are without a doubt women from my past who consider me to have been a life changing partner... one who made them recognize things about themselves that might have been years away from them recognizing for themselves. I think perhaps that some of this is shown in how many of my exes married or formed extensive years long relationships with the NEXT man they dated after me. I always felt slightly cheated by that. But in my new introspection, I don't necessarily consider that a negative anymore. Would I have liked to experience many of those women in the new way they approached life??? Absolutely. But that doesn't mean I should forget that I have perhaps done some good over the years.

I know that sounds egotistical.

Anyway, I spent perhaps half of the last year not in search of a new partner but mourning the loss of the partner I thought was going to be the woman I lived the rest of my life with. And I'm not yet completely over that, though I think some of that is because of the lack of closure.

How am I supposed to feel about someone who kicked me out of her life and has all but erased me from her daily existence who also doesn't want a divorce??? How do those two things work together? Does she not want to divorce me because she thinks we will ultimately return to each other? Does she not talk to me because she's afraid of the effect of letting me back in? Because while I can intellectually wonder about such a thing, what It FEELS like is abandonment. Especially considering that the increased pace towards that state of affairs happened at the same time as I discovered that the already expected end of my life was actually much closer than we had any idea it would be.

A close friend puts this in a harsh but ultimately truthful way. His constant expression is that my ex flunked the "in sickness or in health" part of the vows. And I can't disagree. But he's much more bitter about it than I feel like I am. For example, he will no longer use her name. He refers to her almost exclusively as "the fucking cunt." While I appreciate his loyalty to me, I don't feel that way about her at all.

Please excuse this flow of conciousness info dump. I just needed to release it somewhere. I will, of course, read reactions to it with interest. But I certainly don't expect any of you to really become involved in it. I am, perhaps, again being selfish.
 
Last edited:
Belegon said:
so, I'm having a bit of a crossroads moment, I think.

It's now been just over a year since the final act ( I believe ) of what was supposed to be the last relationship I ever entered. I had placed so much of my belief in that area that I really don't know how to act now. My attempts at finding a new love to pursue have almost been instinct, perhaps because I feel that's what I'm SUPPOSED to do.

This isn't to say I'm not interested in finding a new relationship. But I think perhaps I recognize now, as I always have a little bit, that a large part of my moving from one woman to another has always been as much because I was in love with Being In Love as I was with the women who were captured within my selfishness. I don't necessarily think that is totally a bad thing. I have accomplished some good in the world... there are without a doubt women from my past who consider me to have been a life changing partner... one who made them recognize things about themselves that might have been years away from them recognizing for themselves. I think perhaps that some of this is shown in how many of my exes married or formed extensive years long relationships with the NEXT man they dated after me. I always felt slightly cheated by that. But in my new introspection, I don't necessarily consider that a negative anymore. Would I have liked to experience many of those women in the new way they approached life??? Absolutely. But that doesn't mean I should forget that I have perhaps done some good over the years.

I know that sounds egotistical.

Anyway, I spent perhaps half of the last year not in search of a new partner but mourning the loss of the partner I thought was going to be the woman I lived the rest of my life with. And I'm not yet completely over that, though I think some of that is because of the lack of closure.

How am I supposed to feel about someone who kicked me out of her life and has all but erased me from her daily existence who also doesn't want a divorce??? How do those two things work together? Does she not want to divorce me because she thinks we will ultimately return to each other? Does she not talk to me because she's afraid of the effect of letting me back in? Because while I can intellectually wonder about such a thing, what It FEELS like is abandonment. Espaecially considering that the increased pace towards that state of affairs happened at the same time as I discovered that the already expected end of my life was actually much closer than we had any idea it would be.

A close friend puts this in a harsh but ultimately truthful way. His constant expression is that my ex flunked the "in sickness or in health" part of the vows. And I can't disagree. But he's much more bitter about it than I feel like I am. For eaxmaple, he will no longer use her name. He refers to her almost exclusively as "the fucking cunt." While I appreciate his loyalty to me, I don't feel that way about her at all.

Please excuse this flow of conciousness info dump. I just needed to release it somewhere. I will, of course, read reactions to it with interest. But I certainly don't expect any of you to really become involved in it. I am, perhaps, again being selfish.
Click to expand...
🫂

I wish I had some great advice for you. The better part of fifty years ago, my first wife asked for a divorce out of the blue, to me at least. In retrospect there were warning signs. She wasn't cheating on me, she just thought it wasn't working. I said no to the divorce and spent ten months trying to rebuild the marriage with minimal success and a lot of heart ache. At that point, I realized I had also fallen in love with another woman. I never cheated and I struggled with being in love with two women at the time. Two months later, I moved in with the other woman; we are still married now.

I guess maybe somethings good can come out a bad turn of events.

I hope you find a path that is good for you.

I don't know where you live and divorce laws vary significantly by state. I understood the rules in Maine, where my divorce was, and I researched them in Connecticut, where I had a character get a divorce, but one party can usually file for divorce without the other's approval. If that's the path you think works best for you. It seems like staying married to someone who does not want a relationship with you is a bad idea.
 
Belegon said:
doesn't want a divorce?
Click to expand...

Is there health insurance in that equation? Like both of you are carried on a joint policy? If you have it, and she doesn't, that's motivation. If it's her policy from her job, considering what you're going through, she could feel obligated.

My (long ago) ex did everything she could to "cancel" me including rifling through my slide collection to cull any pictures of her, but she kept me on her medical insurance while I was job hunting, and then keeping me on it until mine kicked in. At that point she filed California no-fault papers and I signed off.
 
But there's always plenty of fault to go around!
MrPixel said:
Is there health insurance in that equation? Like both of you are carried on a joint policy? If you have it, and she doesn't, that's motivation. If it's her policy from her job, considering what you're going through, she could feel obligated.

My (long ago) ex did everything she could to "cancel" me including rifling through my slide collection to cull any pictures of her, but she kept me on her medical insurance while I was job hunting, and then keeping me on it until mine kicked in. At that point she filed California no-fault papers and I signed off.
Click to expand...
 
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