DFDU Strikes Again

Post deleted by author, too much!

Y'all be pretty now, ya heah.

Reunion Approaches

April 20 - You cannot lie to yourself. Your mind knows the truth of yoour thoughts. Meditations from "Conversations with God Book 1" page 11
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Hi alkie, hope your last few days have been great. Saturday was a helluva lot wet here in Houston. I mean wet. DId I say wet? Sat night was Hoedown at Lambda following the speaker meeting. An old friend has returned from a couple of years of more exploring out there. He is young and I hope and pray that he gets it this time. The speaker Saturday night talked about how he had been a chronic slipper and finally fot it and how grateful he was for the arms of Lambda to always be open. This could not have been planned better.

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The Hoedown started at 9:30 and I got to dance a whole dance this year before I started losing my breath. Minus those 30 lbs. has made a diffence I think.I'd like to be down 60 pounds more next year but 30 is fine. It's all fine as long as it is down.

I left about 11:30 and was home by midnight. I could not help but compare that to my drinking days when I was never home before 2 AM when out, which was usually 31. (31 is the new 24/7) the change is SWEET!

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Yesterday afternoon the phone rang and it was my ole classmate from 1959, Sueanna. I had told her I would pick her up when she came in, so that was done at 2 PM this afternoon. We spent the afternoon together, drove around and then had dinner at the Cafe Adobe at the Marq E. She had mentioned she really missed Tex Mex so I suggested we go. It was well worth it. Then I took her back to her hotel and we will probably get together again this week. Then Friday night is the start of the 50th High School Reunion. Hot damned, the last time I saw a lot of these people, they were 17 or 18. This is going to be interesting. We are having an informal dinner at the Potato Patch on 1960 Friday night and then the BIG day is Saturday with a reception starting at 2PM and dinner at 5:30. Hell, that's my usual lunch hour. My mind is going 90 to nothing and I have all these scenarios going on on KFUK. But I've done a good job of keeping that in check and am just going to let it play out. I feel a bit of pride that I can do this. Being sober sure does change us and the way we handle life in session. Man, Sobriety Rocks.

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Tonight I am grateful for:

• God, my Higher Power
• My Sobriety
• Mamie, my OCD loving schnauzer
• My Sponso
• My Right Eye
• Being sighted
• Memory lane with an old friend.
• Living through a Monday without a movie.
• Being up today before the crack of Noon.
• A beautiful day.
• Humor and laughter. (laughter is good for the soul so my soul has to be doing pretty damned good.)

Y'all be pretty now, ya heah.

Mamie, the fearless hunter.

April 16 - God is in the sadness and in laughter. In the bitter and the sweet. Meditations from "Conversations with God - Book 1" page 60

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Hi my alkie friends. How the hell are ya. Things are pretty good in this neck of the woods. My left eye is improving. Things are blurry but the focus problem is gone. The distortion is gone. I am so grateful for the improvement I just want to shout from the streets, the rooftops, and the top of the world. Actually, I am on the top of the world. As long as I am sober, I will remain on top of the world. Sobriety ROCKS.

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Now to the story on the fearless hunter - Mamie. Mamie is my 14.5 lb. miniature schnauzer. She is quite the little hunter as are all schnauzers. It is part of their breeding. She goes nuts with squirrels, birds, or whatever when it is outside and when I let her out, she just turns into a silver streak. She's fun to watch. I call her my OCD Schnauzer because of this. She is on 24/7. This past Monday night I was watching TV and she was in my lap and then her head popped straight up and out of the lap she went across the living room to the fireplace. Her head was just a bobbing and her stance was as if she were stalking something. Then she tried to get in the fireplace but the screen blocked her. So I got the flashlight and beamed it into the fireplace and there it was, a blackbird. It was about that time that the bird flew above the screen and started flying crazily through the LR. I have a cathedral ceiling and the poor thing was just bouncing around on the beams and into the wall. And within inches was Mamie just chasing it around the LR into the Dining Room and I ran to the back door and opened it. I thought the bird had flown out because Mamie went out and a quick run and back in. So I sat down to watch the news and listen to her rummaging around the room as if the bird were still in the room. A couple of minutes later she was at my feet, pawing me and growling. I looked down and I'll be damned if she wasn't sitting there with the blackbird in her mouth "Look Daddy, DINNER". The look on her face was priceless. Such pride, such accomplishment. As I got up and yelled she dropped the bird and I picked up a plastic paper sleeve from the paper basket next to my chair and put the bird in it and threw it out the back door. She was fine with that and did not try to go out there. Later I let her out for her last "business" and she did not go near where the bird should have landed. The next morning the bird was gone. Probably was eaten by a raccoon or a possum or a cat or - maybe it just passed out from fright and flew off later in the night. I would like to think the latter, but I will never know. Oh, by the way, I closed the flute or whatever in the fireplace and now the heat or air will now just be in the house. I wonder how much heat escaped this year.

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Tonight I am grateful for:

• God my Higher Power
• My Sobriety
• Mamie, my OCD Schnauzer
• My Sponsor, went home yesterday.
• My right eye
• Being sighted
• Having what I need
• My lost insurance check being reissued
• The simple things in life.
• All y'all

Y'all be pretty now, ya heah!

Better today.

April 15 - True Masters are those who have chosen to make a life, rather than a living. Meditations from "Conversations with God - Book 1" page 60

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Slept like a log last night. I'm sure that the anticipation of the injections, the 3 hours sleep the night before all contributed to the fact that I slept from 12:30 AM until 1:30 PM today without interruption. My eye felt 100% percent better than when I went to bed. My sight in the left eye is blurry, but I do not see the distortions that I did before. Time will tell. Also gone is the problem with focus. It is supposed to be better each day. And as a good alcoholic I also know it will be in God's time, not mine.

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I got some things done today that I have needed to do for weeks. I got two tubs of wash done. I sorted out my "to be washed stack" (its huge), and sorted from that the things to go to the cleaners.(30 pieces) OH MY, what I did accomplish.

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Tonight I am grateful for:

• God, my Higher Power
• My Sobriety
• Mamie my OCD schnauzer.
• My Sponsor
• My Right Eye
• Being sighted
• All the well wishes from my BLOGGIES.
• All y'all.

Y'all be pretty now, ya heah.

It's Over for Now

God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change
The courage to change the things I can
And the wisdom to know the difference.
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Now I lay me down to sleep
I pray to God my soul to keep
If I should die before I wake
I Pray the Lord my soul to take.
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Those are two of the prayers I said today. The experience was not unpleasant, but the awakening of the eye a few hours later is a bit uncomfortable, but not more than I can handle. I just want you all
to know that the encouragement, the experience of you that have had similar experiences, helped me to go forward with this. I slept most of the afternoon and am heading to bed as soon as I finish this post.
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It's okay. It's over. And I'm very much sober. Just won't get much
better than that.
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Tonight I am grateful for:

• God, my Higher Power
• My Sobriety
• Mamie, my OCD schnauzer
• My Sponsor
• My right eye
• Being sighted
• Daave
• All y'all.

Now y'all be pretty now, ya heah.

Tomorrow is the Big Day

April 13 - The reason that the true Master does not complain is that the true Master is not suffering, but simply experiencing a set of circumstances that you cal insufferable. Meditations from "Conversations with God - Book 1" page 107

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Hi y'all. Hope you had a fun day yesterday. I spent the day at Joe's with a couple of other friends. Joe fixed a great Leg of Lamb with my potatoes, onions, and carrots. The other two friends brought a salad and a chocolate raspberry cake. A good time and full tummies was enjoyed by all. In fact as soon as I finish this post I will have me the piece of cake I brought home last night. Now that is a miracle that a piece of cake survived in my house for over 24 hours. Truth be told, I actually forgot all about it until I just wrote about it. Me forgetting cake - well, it did happen.

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Tomorrow is my eye injection day. Daave and Hayden are picking me up about 12:15 or 12:30 and hauling my BA out to the eye doctors. I'm as nervous as I would be if I were sliding down a razor sharp banister into a vat of alcohol. OH SHIT, OUCH! Well maybe not.

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Tonight I am grateful for:

• God, My Higher Power
• My Sobriety
• Mamie, my OCD schnauzer
• My Sponsor
• My Right Eye
• Being Sighted
• being sober to face this
• Praying for the Doctor's steady hand as she jabs the needle in my eye.
• For those of you that have had similar treatment and assured me I would not feel anything.

Y'all be pretty now, ya heah!

Happy Easter!

April 12 - Your soul seeks the highest feeling. It seeks to experience--to be-- perfect love. Meditations from "Conversations with God - Book 1" p85

Happy Easter.

Y'all be pretty now, ya heah.

From what happened to what I chose.

April 10 - You can choose to be a person who has resulted simply from what has happened, or from what you have chosen to be and do about what has happened. Meditations from "Conversations with God - Book 1" page 122

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Hi Alkies. Today's quote from CWG just really hit home with me. I certainly chose to be something other than what my early life dictated. Even with my alcoholism, I chose to be a "higher class" drunk that my parents, both natural and step. By higher class, I drank the good stuff. I drank out of high class containers (crystal, silver, etc.). It never occurred to me that although I was not a falling down drunk in a low class beer joint in a low class part of town, I was still a falling down drunk in a higher class club in a more cultured and affluent part of town. But the bottom line - a drunk is a drunk is a drunk. Here are some of the differences in parents and me.

1. Abusive. Them - yes Me - no.
2. Cheated on spouse - Them - yes; Me - Not allowed by law to have a spouse, but did cheat on my partner but not in the flagrant way that my parents did. Mine were isolated happenings. (cheating is cheating)
3. Drank cheap wines, beer, hard liquors. Them - yes; me - no. I drank the higher end.
4. Marked my bottles and had a fight with my partner because they drank out of my bottle. Them - yes. Me - no, my partners were mostly non-drinkers.
5. Committed to state mental facility for shock treatment for alcoholism. Father - yes; Mother -no; Stepfather - no. Me - no. (My self commitment to a psychiatric hospital was because of Major Depression which started the process that led to my getting sober)
6. Jailed for drunkenness. Father - many times; Mother - several times; Stepfather - prison. Me - jailed once. (I was just lucky)
7. Alcohol led to career loss. All of us - yes.
8. Made an assertive effort to be better off than my parents- father - yes; mother - yes; stepfather - no; me - yes.
9. I was determined not to let the environment that I grew up in keep me down, or excused what I did because I was abused. Except for my alcoholism, I did accomplish this.
10. Take anyone's life - Father - no; Mother - killed my stepfather; Stepfather - killed 5 men during prohibition; Me - no (but at 14 my Mother did take the gun out of my hand and shot my stepfather)
11. I rose above all this negativity in most areas of my life. However, in my alcoholism, I did do a lot of the same types of things my parents did. I lied, I cheated, I stole, I was manipulative, and I was always right.
12. Became Sober: Father - Sober thru AA last 25 years of his life. Mother - quit drinking at 75 and died sober 6 years later. Stepfather - Mother shot him before he could take any positive action. (I never thought about that before tonight) Me - Sober thru AA since January 20, 1992.

So yes, maybe I am ending up as my father did. Again this is an area I had never contemplated. Dad got sober at 48 and died at 73. I got sober at 50 and whether or not I beat his record is in the hands of God.

So all in all, my life has been quite different than those of my parents. I did not live my life, nor blame my frailties on my upbringing. Thanks to events in my youth beyond my control, I never said I did this or did not do this because of the way I was raised. I was so ashamed of the way I was raised and the white trash lifestyle of my parents, that there was no way I was going to be like them. I might have had silk sheets so to speak, but when it really comes down to it, my alcoholism brought me down to their level in ways I Never could admit. That is the freedom that being a sober member of Alcoholics Anonymous has give me. That is the freedom that forgiveness as I have learned in AA has given me. There are many similarities in the road each of us trudged as we got here, but we were all(IMO) just garden variety drunks, whether it was just a dirt garden or a formal garden it still boils down to a drunk is a drunk is a drunk. I'm so glad that I'm no longer a drunk but an alcoholic. As the old joke goes - a drunk is a person who drinks heavily, an alcoholic has to go to those damned meetings. Thank God for those meetings. Thank God for inspiring those men to give us the 12 steps, the 12 traditions, the 12 principles, and the 12 promises. And a way of life that is a daily reprieve from hell. It just doesn't get any better than that.

Tonight I am grateful for:

• God, my Higher Power
• My Sobriety
• Mamie, my OCD schnauzer
• My Sponsor
• My Right EYE
• Being Sighted
• Only 4 days to the injection procedure on my Left Eye
• All y'all.

Y'all be pretty now, ya heah.

One More Day.

April 9 - Every prayer--every thought,every feeling, every statement--is creative. To the extent that it is fervently held as truth, to that degree will it be made manifest in your experience. Meditations from "Conversations with God - Book 1" page 12

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Hey you there, alkies. How the hell are ya. This one is fine, made it through another day. I was totally bowled over this a.m. when I signed on and I had 10 hits from y'all. Thanks for the response. It is so great to be missed. I don't not post on purpose. It's just as I said when I first started to post, I don't promise every day, I don't want that commitment. However, if I do stop blogging, I will leave a post to that affect. OK? My goodness, the poets are out in force on the ole blogosphere. It's kind of nice for a change. I don't criticize anyone's style, I'm just glad you're all out there. I enjoy reading your posts, the comments, and the quotes.

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Today was a good day. I saw my shrink and he let me leave after an hour, so I guess I'm making some progress. At least they haven't come to take me away. Two weeks from tomorrow night is the start of the 50th reunion of my high school. Damned that makes me feel so old. Speaking of old, I had my transmission drained, flushed, and refilled today. They gave me a price and I reminded them that they told me another price, they checked my record and lowered it another $10. I then said beggingly, what about AARP, AAA, or Senior Senior Senior discount. She, yep she, laughed said oh you can't be that old and I said I'm 67 and she gave me another 10% discount. When the truck was finished, she gave me my keys and said "So, Sober and Crazy, huh. Well, tell Bill hello for me." We're just everywhere aren't we. (My bumper sticker is "SOBER and CRAZY." The sober part is God's work and the crazy part is my work. Thank you God for inspiring these two men to start such a life saving and changing program called Alcoholics Anonymous. It works.

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Tonight I am grateful for:

• God, my Higher Power
• My Sobriety
• Mamie, my OCD schnauzer.
• My Sponsor
• My right eye.
• Being sober.
• My retinologist
• Tuesday is one day closer.
• All y'all.

Y'all be pretty now, ya heah.

Hello Alkies

There is no need to recriminate yourself. Simply notice what you've been choosing and choose again. Meditations from "Conversations with God - Book 1" page 119

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Hi there my friends and fellow alkies. Life has been in session and I have lived with it and through it. No drama, just one foot in front of the other. This past Saturday, April 4, 2009 was the 28th anniversary of my meeting Vic. The past few years the day has come and gone and I've thought about it afterwards. I don't know why it was different this year, it just was. As the day wore on, I got a little more down. Went to my AA meeting at Lambda that night after dining with Daave, John, and Rick. The speaker was quite good, but then she is a friend of mine, but she still shared what it was like, what happened and what it is like now. After the meeting I hung around a bit and then left. As I was leaving Daave flagged me down, and just said Don't be such a stranger, and that triggered a rush of tears, quickly damned up, and it just made me feel so good. Just that one moment of someone caring was just the ticket. Now the evening had been a good one, saw a lot of friends as usual. But I guess I just needed that one thing at that one moment in time and Voila, the ride home was without the burden that I did not know I was really carrying on my shoulders. I guess I lied above when I said there was no drama. Just a tidge. It was a God Shot, and I love me some God Shots.

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Tonight I am Grateful for:

• God my Higher Power
• My Sobriety
• Mamie, my OCD schnauzer
• My Sponsor who is still on the mend. He is certainly an inspiration to me. He's been hospitalized for the past 7 weeks, but his projected attitude is just amazingly positive all the way.
• My Right Eye
• Being sighted
• Vision in left eye has improved significantly in the last three weeks. But I have had focusing problems.
• Tuesday, April 14, I receive the injections to my left eye.
• Medicare will not cover it, But my United Healthcare through IBM is covering it.
• Still sober, no matter what.
• Now y'all be pretty now, ya heah.