Meet Your Maker

Lord, I have such trouble getting to sleep in the evenings, and thereafter sleeping for any length of time.

Just as the night before, I found myself awake and curious enough last night that I was to check the time and discover that it was around 2:57 a.m. and I was not going to need to be roused by my 3 a.m. cellphone alarm.

As for my walk to challenge my damaged right knee, even though it was very lightly raining outside and it was nigh 3:45 a.m. before I was underway, I had my longest walk yet ─ I doubled my usual distance of at least the previous week and walked all the way to the Coast Capital Savings headquarters so that I could finally deposit the small ($112 and change) cheque my younger brother had given me early this month.

The 1½-mile round trip even saw me cut through the elementary school property about three blocks from here where I would formerly go to get some exercise with pull-ups and chin-ups. Had it not been raining and keeping everything wet, I believe that I might have dared to see how much strength I have lost since my accident on March 1st. My upper arms are looking decidedly stringier now that muscle is wasting away.

But I did the full darned walk, although I was initially disillusioned at coming into view of the credit union that there was a lit-up Brinks truck parked by the ATM I wanted to use, and some movement in its vicinity. When it was still there by the time I had gotten across King George Boulevard (and requiring ALL of the 30 seconds allotted for a pedestrian to cross at a green light), I felt myself with no option but to go around the building to a second ATM virtually kitty-corner to the first. I just do not like using that alternate ATM because the area tends to be a hangout for street people and such, but the light rain was working in my favour and deterring anyone from choosing to be idly exposed to the wet.

However, I had no sooner gotten out my wallet and deposit envelope and so forth when I was aware of someone approaching and practically upon me who had come from the direction of the highway.

It turned out to be two of the Brinks guards ─ a locked security door for the ATM was immediately to the other side of me, and these guys were bound for it.

So I queried if I had time to complete my transaction, and was assured by a probable South Asian male that it was no problem as the pair unlocked the door and went inside.

My deposit envelope had gotten rather wet from the rain I had walked in, but the ATM accepted it without issue.

I had just finished my transaction when the door opened again and the same guard peeked out and asked if I needed further time, so I assured him that all was completed, and I gave him my sincere thanks.

And then the ¾-mile walk back home. I rather slowed down well into it, but that may have only been due to my objective having been accomplished and now there was no true rush.

I would have hated to have tried the walk without my five-foot walking stick. The prop truly does help give me confidence about my leg's stability.

When first I cut through the school property, the irregularity of the walking surface at that point made me aware that my knee cap (patella) might have its tracking affected by the trauma of the accident and the consequent swelling and inflammation, for it seemed to 'snag' a little.

Also, there was a fairly short downhill stretch of sidewalk due to a small hill as I approached King George ─ I found myself having to slow down and walk carefully as I proceeded down the slope. The quadriceps muscles to either side of my upper knee seem somewhat atrophied and stiffened ─ it is they, I am judging, that would fail if I attempted to bear my weight on a too-bent knee, and which keep threatening to buckle if I do not walk carefully.

The vastus medialis ─ the so-called tear-shaped muscle that stands out so starkly on a well-muscled leg ─ does not feel at all distinctive when I do my best to flex my thigh. Both it and the vastus lateralis to the outside of my lower thigh are what feel to be rather inflexible and so weakened that they cannot presently support me if I placed my weight on a bent knee.

I am tempted to see if I can do even a partial squat, seeking to keep most of my weight on my 'good' leg, but at this point I lack the confidence. I am not interested in potentially courting pain and maybe a setback to what healing seems thus far to have taken place.

It is a shame that I feel I need that walking stick, otherwise lacking essential stability when walking unaided. With the stick, I could hike to nearby No Frills early tomorrow ─ it's maybe four blocks away ─ and accomplish a little grocery shopping. But I do not have the social comfort to be entering a store with any such semi-weapon; and I am just too unstable on my feet without its support ─ especially if I was bearing groceries in a tote bag.

Anyway, after I was back from my trip to the ATM, it must have been close to 6:30 a.m. by the time I returned to bed. And then I heard my younger brother emerge from his bedroom and head on downstairs, apparently unable to sleep.

Despite my earlier activity and bad night's sleep, I still had an abominable time of it getting further sleep. A couple of times I realized that I had a fragment of dream in my awareness, so I surely must have dropped off for a brief time.

Just after 8 a.m. I rose with the intention of maybe joining my brother, for he had earlier turned on the T.V. But when I opened my bedroom door, I saw that he had bedded down on the chesterfield and the T.V. was off.

So I climbed back into bed and remained there until possibly a little past 9 a.m. Upon opening my bedroom door, I was just in time to coincide with my wife exiting her bedroom to use the bathroom, so we exchanged quiet good mornings. My brother was still lying of the chesterfield and covered up with a comforter.

Soon enough as I passed some time in my bedroom at this bedside computer, I heard the T.V. again, and realized that my brother was again up. By this time it was around 9:30 a.m., and I was keen on my day's first big mug of hot instant coffee, so downstairs I went.

Upon fixing up that beverage and then joining my brother, he had already seen enough of the repetitive news stories, so he invited me to put our Android TV Box into play, but let me know that he had a noon rendezvous with one of his drinking buddies and would be heading off for a bus soon after 11 a.m. after taking the time to get ready for that venture.

I first tuned in a 28-minute (28:13) video uploaded yesterday to YouTube's The Pleb 🇨🇦 Reporter channel: Canada's NEW Liberal Prime Minister EMBARRASSED by construction workers.

Next I tuned in the last half or so of an engrossing documentary we had to break from yesterday morning. At nearly 48 minutes, it had been uploaded October 6, 2016, to YouTube's Real Stories channel: Did My Daughter-In-Law Kill My Son?

Gripping true crime documentary about a woman fighting to prove her daughter-in-law was responsible for her son's death.

DailyMail.co.uk has a good article about the case that they last updated Setpember 12, 2006: A mother's revenge for the murder of her son.

And according to a piece at Worklizard.com that was updated July 15, 2023, Evelyn was still serving her 40-year sentence.

My brother headed on upstairs after the documentary to begin readying. After a little time, I decided to play one further video for my own interest. Uploaded yesterday to YouTube's Juno News channel, it was 42½ minutes: Mark Carney’s DISASTROUS trip to Edmonton.

On today's episode of The Candice Malcolm Show, Candice is joined by Canadian YouTuber Martin Bélanger, better known as “MartyUpNorth,” to discuss Mark Carney's latest trip to Edmonton.

Also, Candice explains why she thinks Pierre Poilievre will win the next election.

My wife emerged from her bedroom very soon after my brother left.

Midday she apparently left to likely do some grocery shopping, by which time Bev was downstairs watching T.V. because I had turned it off somewhat earlier and retreated here to my bedroom.

My wife was quite busy in the kitchen. I rather petered out and again resorted to my bed, but I left my bedroom door ajar in case my wife cared to communicate with me abut anything. I'm unsure if I actually napped at all.

She was scheduled to work in the latter afternoon, so I suppose that it was around or soon past 3 p.m. that she left us on her rather long drive.

And that basically catches me up thus far in the day at 5:27 p.m.

If my brother returns home very early in the evening, maybe the eight-evening drought for the two of us watching any of our evening shows will have come to an end. But if he comes home blitzed and / or late, then I reckon I will be having yet another relatively early evening.

But for now, I am going to take a break and report back into the evening with an update.

★★★

My brother returned well past 8 p.m. ─ maybe even around 8:30 p.m. And he was plastered.

I chose to watch a show here at my bedside computer ─ Batwoman. Specifically, it was episode nine ("Meet Your Maker") of final season three. That Bridget Regan as Poison Ivy is overwhelmingly beautiful and bloody hot!

It certainly was an interesting episode, and I had a can of Cariboo Malt (7.9% alcohol) to better enjoy it with. If interested, my source was this GOOJARA.to link. But as I have said before, I doubt that the website will survive.

I'm sure my brother was passed out when I initially looked downstairs. No matter ─ I have no intention of wasting my time trying to watch anything with him downstairs even if Bev had gone to bed. Their drunken gravelly-voiced dialogue exchanges are beyond my forbearance, so he alone would be irrepressible with his need to expound upon every little detail in a show that inspired a thought.

It is 10:08 p.m., so I am just going to wrap things up here at my computer and get to bed. I cannot yet risk walking in the early daytime to do any shopping, so I think that I will set my cellphone alarm for 3 a.m. and walk over to the elementary school playground about three blocks away and see if I can do any pull-ups at all anymore.