Toward the conclusion of yesterday's post, I began an explanation of why ─ after having CHQM 103.5 tuned in on our living room stereo for well over 15 years ─ I now have radio station CHLG 104.3 ('The Breeze') as the default station.
I said that I detest CHQM's morning show where the crew of radio personalities strive to outdo one another with hysterical outbursts of laughing and guffaws practically every time one of them says something ─ nobody is that hilarious.
I think that there are as many as four different radio personalities who are regulars on that morning show, and sometimes they even have a guest or two.
Well, that crew came to be after the previous duo who hosted the morning radio show for 19 years were turfed around mid-March 2014.
The former hosts ─ Mike Shaeffer and Tara McGuire ─ mattered to me; and I resented the station for tossing them out without any forewarning to the listeners, just to make way for the newcomers with their "crackling energy and non-stop hilarity" (as one article on the turnover described them).
I'm now 70 years old ─ I have nothing in common with the sort of humour nor the topics of interest that the current morning show hosts revel in. But I liked Mike & Tara ─ I had listened to them for years while I was at work.
Unfortunately, I had little choice but to stick with the station here at home ─ our stereo could not pick up any other "adult contemporary" radio stations with any degree of strength. It was only during the latter part of last month when I was researching Vancouver area radio stations that might be offering a Christmas music format ─ which CHQM has been doing for a number of consecutive years come the month of December ─ that I came across mention that CHLG was also playing Christmas music.
I was essentially unfamiliar with CHLG, and thus considerably delighted and surprised that it came in as well as CHQM. I can only suppose that its prior music format was not one I would have listened to, and that is why it had never before been a listening option for me.
CHLG proved to be playing some Christmas music that I was not hearing at CHQM ─ including one song that I very much get a kick out of, no matter who sings it: "Baby, It's Cold Outside". I well recall how back in 2018, CHQM announced that it would no longer play the song because they were falling in line with the ridiculous controversy that the song was sexist and smacked of sexual harassment.
This pissed me right off, and anytime I was here at my computer during December, I would listen to a U.S. station.
I confess that I am grateful to CHQM for beginning their Christmas music switch in mid-November as they started doing this past Fall ─ I really appreciated the earlier start.
Also, back in December 2010 when I was still recovering from serious surgery to my left knee on November 5, I was deep in the dumps and yet in pain, for I think that I only resorted to acetaminophen the two days after the surgery, then went cold turkey. Instead, I would start into some alcohol come the evenings.
Well, I was seated here at my computer on December 1st with CHQM playing its usual music, when at 9:00 a.m. without any ado the station began to play Burl Ives' hit "A Holly, Jolly Christmas" ─ and I erupted into great joy, for that song was followed by more Christmas music.
The seasonal music switch had arrived without any announcement.
I needed it so damned badly.
I will never forget that morning, and always be grateful to CHQM for how wonderful the music switch was for me.
However, as long as CHLG keeps its current "adult contemporary" music format and adheres to having a solitary morning radio personality instead of a silly and raucous crew, then I will stick with them. But they had better offer Christmas music next November as early into the month as possible, or I will have to choose CHQM until CHLG also makes the switch, too.
Finally ─ and not too incidentally ─ since the end of this season's Christmas music format, CHLG claims to play the songs that the other stations have forgotten, and I have to admit that I have been hearing songs that I was just never hearing on CHQM.
oooooooooooooo
After my wife left here late yesterday afternoon for the weekend, I entered into the evening without my usual midday or early afternoon nap that I was unable to have (due to her unexpected presence here at home).
And so it was that before my younger brother was even home, I had lost the desire to be sitting up late watching T.V. with him. We watch our shows through the 'apps' that I have downloaded into our T9 Android 8.1 TV Box which he has no expertise in operating.
I have an arbitrary 9:00 p.m. cutoff for him whereby if he is not home by then, I write him off and get to bed early. He is almost always too plastered by 9:00 p.m. to bother trying to watch any television with because he just cannot reliably sustain full consciousness. And anything he passes out during is then something that I have to rewatch when he is sober.
So I have decided to stop running that tedious risk.
So I have decided to stop running that tedious risk.
And so it was that as I sat here upstairs at my computer, when I heard him come through the front door less than 10 minutes before the arrival of that hour, I desperately withdrew lest I become involved with him. In truth, I was abed just ahead of 9:00 p.m.
Over the evening I had consumed a fair amount of fluid such as a soupy supper and plain ol' water. A consequence of that was that although I lapsed into some sleep, around an hour after going to bed I was again awake and needed to sneak out of my bedroom to use the toilet.
Some further sleep arrived, and again I had to seek bathroom relief with my brother still downstairs watching T.V.
Sleep would come and go, but I was always comfortable in bed. Part of the reason for that was a very chilly wind outside, gusts of which kept entering the house through open upstairs windows. My bedroom was distinctly and unpleasantly cool.
However, by 2:00 a.m. I had gotten my fill of uselessly drifting in and out of sleep, so I rose and was soon at work adding content into a new post I began two days earlier at one of my six hosted websites.
Ultimately, I was preparing myself for a very early shopping expedition ─ the destination store is around 2¾ miles from here, and I would be walking (I do not drive). It opens at 7:00 a.m., so I wanted to leave here by 6:15 a.m. if possible.
Well, I had grown rather tired by 6:00 a.m., which was four hours after I had first risen. Even so, I dutifully got myself ready, and anon was on my way.
However, I had only walked a very short distance along the brief alleyway beside our house that pedestrians use to gain access from the cul-de-sac I live in to the main avenue (and vice versa, of course), when my conscience got the better of me.
You see, even though I am often convinced that God is monstrous and has forsaken me, I am one of those who believes that Saturday is the true Sabbath. And further, even though I have not attended a church service (except for weddings and funerals) since 1964 when I was 14 years old, at heart I am still Sabbatarian.
Because of this, it is extremely difficult for me to shop on that day.
However, I am rarely able to go shopping anywhere during the week because the world is just too damned busy out there. The weekends are when I prefer to do my shopping.
However, I am rarely able to go shopping anywhere during the week because the world is just too damned busy out there. The weekends are when I prefer to do my shopping.
The reasoning struck me ─ as I wended my way along the brief alleyway ─ that I did not actually need anything that I could not go forth and purchase early tomorrow in the a.m.
In addition, tomorrow in the early a.m. would not be as busy as today would have been at that time of day, for I would not be back home again until at least 8:00 a.m. due to the time I would spend wandering around in the store ─ I have only shopped there once or twice before, so I have to search for the items I hope to buy, and the store is huge.
With that realization, I smartly turned about and came directly back home ─ I was not yet out of sight of the house.
The wisdom of this choice became even more apparent around midday when my younger brother gave me his monthly expenses reconciliation cheque. It's for a little more than $220. I will need to visit an ATM to deposit it, and the one I would do so at is nearly a mile from here ─ I can make the deposit on my way to do that desired shopping.
Had I gone shopping this early a.m., I would now have been faced with making the trip to deposit the cheque just for that sake alone.
The wisdom of this choice became even more apparent around midday when my younger brother gave me his monthly expenses reconciliation cheque. It's for a little more than $220. I will need to visit an ATM to deposit it, and the one I would do so at is nearly a mile from here ─ I can make the deposit on my way to do that desired shopping.
Had I gone shopping this early a.m., I would now have been faced with making the trip to deposit the cheque just for that sake alone.
Anyway, it was after 7:00 a.m. before I returned to bed once I returned home early this morning.
I had turned on the Christmas lights in the living room when first I rose, so I had turned them off when I left on my aborted hike.
My younger brother normally spends Saturday evenings with his girlfriend Bev, and then stays overnight at her home. If that holds true, then I ought to have no problem getting to bed early this evening so that I can make that journey tomorrow a.m.
Once it gets dark later today, I will be turning on the indoor Christmas lights, and also all of the outdoor lights. It is quite possible that this will be the final time that I do so this Christmas season.
Christmas and New Year's Eve can be typically brutal on me, for I am unduly sentimental. I hate letting go of Christmas and all of its trappings, and I feel like a lot of me dies along with the year that is about to pass come New Year's Eve.
I have no friends near whom I can visit, nor family. Apart from the people comprising this household ─ i.e., my brother, my distant and generally absentee much-younger wife, and my two adult stepsons (ages 22 and 25) ─ I am utterly isolated socially.
Right up until two days ago, I was still tuning in Christmas movies early in the evening when my brother was not yet home, and watching them while getting worked up with some alcohol. It can be emotionally taxing to the extreme.
I was also playing Christmas music via online Christmas radio stations anytime I was here at my computer.
But yesterday, I realized that all of that fixation had somehow just fallen away overnight. I was free of the consuming obsession ─ an addiction, in essence. And now, I ought to be good until the imminence of next November when I will start seeking my maudlin Christmas fix through Christmas music and movies once again.
The Christmas season is the most likely time of year when I will suicide. It makes me feel more lonely and pathologically nostalgic than I can hardly bear.
It helps not at all that I have allowed my wife to plunge me so deep into debt that I am now trapped in this house and will never likely draw a breath again as a debt-free man. I will be dying in debt.
But enough of this talk.
But enough of this talk.
I have not yet exercised today, so I am going to post this blog entry relatively early today so that I can then work myself up and be able to tackle that exercising effort. Then I will put some more work into adding content to that website post I was working on during the pre-dawn hours.
The morning started off as quite dry and fairly clear, but the afternoon is seeing some light rain. My understanding is that we may have rather wet weathir for the next three days.
The morning started off as quite dry and fairly clear, but the afternoon is seeing some light rain. My understanding is that we may have rather wet weathir for the next three days.
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