Coney and the bees. Coney was our wiener dog. Our black and tan wiener dog. He lived to be 15, and Coney was a character from the moment he came as a puppy, to his last few days on the Earth. Coney, when he was a puppy, was the most stubborn character in the world. And he liked the bees. There were some bees by our mailbox, and Coney knew that some other dogs had peed on the mailbox. And he was bound and determined that he was going to pee there too. I mean, he was, like, six months old. And he went to the mailbox. And he sniffed the flowers, and he sniffed, and sniffed. And he peed on the mailbox, and he bounced along, and he was very happy, and all of a sudden, a couple of bees came and stung him in the snout. His little snout -- ‘cause he was little -- his little snout just puffed up like a puff pastry, almost, and I had to take him to the vet.  We knew that he'd been stung by a bee, and we didn't know exactly what the deal was, but we picked him up. Took him to the vet. His vet was one -- it was one of the first times that he had been to the vet besides having his shots. He didn't fight going in. He went in. [Name], who is our dog's vet to this day, was fresh out of Michigan State Vet School. And she looked at him, and she started laughing, and she said, “I know it's not funny. I know he's gotta be having a hard time breathing, and all the rest of this, but he looks hilarious.” And we all agreed that Coney looked absolutely hilarious.  And so she gave him some Benadryl, and she said, “He's gonna sleep for the next -- probably sleep for almost the next 24 hours.” She says, “‘Cause I'm giving him kind of a lot of Benadryl.” She said, “He's gonna be -- I don't want him to scratch his nose.” And she said, “I don't wanna put a cone on him ‘cause he's so little.” She said, “Let's just see if he just goes to sleep, and if he just sleeps, it’ll -- you know, it'll be fine when he wakes up.”  And so we came home, and I put…

I really love a bumblebee. Now I have been stung by a bumblebee before. And actually, that stung taught me how patient -- that sting, I mean, taught me how patient they are. I was at my parents' house, I think, and something kept landing on my arm and I assumed it was a fly, so I brushed it off. And it just kept landing on the same spot and I brushed it off. And I, I mean, I must've brushed it off half a dozen times. And the last time, you know, suddenly I felt this sting, and it really hurt. Bumblebees, I guess, have a big stinger or a lot of venom or something. I mean, they really let you know. But, so, because I looked down and realized, "Oh my god," you know, "A bumblebee is on my arm, stinging me and he's ticked -- she's ticked off." And I just realized how patient that bee had been. 'Cause clearly, it really wanted to be on my arm. Why, I don't know. And it let me brush it off so many times before it finally had had enough. So, I always have a lot of bumblebees around my flower beds in the spring and, um, I don't know. There's something about them. They're kind of goofy looking and, I don't know, it's easy to think of them as sweet, and, um, I just love them.

I had put some sprouted sweet potatoes on my porch. And they were so big and so sprouted, and the sprouts had gotten so big, I felt bad throwing them away. So I thought to myself, well, maybe I should bury them and then like see what happens. But I put them on the back porch temporarily, and I never got around to actually burying the sweet potatoes. And instead, a groundhog, which I've never seen a groundhog at this property, every day started to eat the sweet potato. So every day, there'd be another fraction of it, like, gone. He was quite cute. So I -- instead of moving the sweet potato or doing anything, I would just watch him and I would just watch him eat the sweet potato. And so, anyway, I joked with my coworkers like, "Is it bad to befriend a groundhog?" Like, "Is there any drawbacks to this?" And they were all like, "It's a pest, kill it," "No, don't you dare, that's terrible," "They're gonna ruin your foundation, they're gonna destroy your yard," blablabla. And I was like, "Well, he hasn't yet. Like, he's come back every day for the sweet potato, but there's been no disturbance to my yard." Well, I looked it up. And yeah, groundhogs will eat the larvae of hornets. So, my groundhog that I befriended, he ate up the nest of the hornet that stung my ankle! So, now, I do need to go back through and completely eradicate the remaining hornets before they rebuild, but besides that, I have not seen any other holes or damage that this groundhog has caused. So I do think this is a superhero groundhog who has come to my rescue, because honest to goodness, I would've the next day or a couple days later mowed again, would've been attacked by hornets again because I -- it didn't even register in my brain that hornets can live in the ground. It just didn't occur to me. Yeah, I wouldn't have ever, I wouldn't have looked. I would've been mowing my lawn again and I would've gotten attacked again. Because obviously I would've picked up right where I left off and I would be like, "Wow, this is the worst. I guess I'm called to not mow my lawn anymore." That is not the case. So now this groundhog has revealed truth to…

My partner was starving, so got her a hot dog and she sat down at the picnic table at our campsite. That was nice, to have a picnic table. And as she was eating, she was leaning on the picnic table and felt a sharp stinging sensation. And it became very clear -- she was like, "Ugh, something just stung me!" She did not handle stings and pain super well. I remember when I first met her, we went hiking pretty early on and she got nicked by a thorn and just a little speck of blood popped up on her jeans and she almost passed out at the sight. Um, and so she was trying her best to be tough, but the sting blew up pretty quickly. We don't know what stung her because it was dark outside. I don't know if she put her elbow down on a bee, or... we actually didn't know what other living stinging things existed in the state of Washington at the time, so it could have been anything. But you know, I -- we instantly dropped everything. I took her back to the car. We had ice in the cooler and, you know, she went to the driver's seat ‘cause the back of the car was full and she wanted to be somewhere that was well lit. She got into the driver's seat, I got into the passenger seat, and I just sat with her to console her and to make sure she had what she needed. And there's, uh -- you know, things settled down. And then she kind of turned to me and got this look on her eye, and I can't remember what she said, I'll have to read my journal, but something along the lines of like, "Oh my god." And I was like, "What? What now?" And like her eyes led to the ceiling of our car, and perfectly in between the two of us on the ceiling was this giant spider. Not tarantula size, so not that big. A few scales down. But a spider much bigger in size than you ever prefer to see on the ceiling of your car. We freaked out. We both skedaddled out of the car, and then closed the doors and peered up and saw the spider also got scared and he trotted toward the back of the vehicle, the…

When covid was starting, I was technically dating this girl, but it was also like, her parents were super homophobic, so it was like supposed to be a secret. And I also didn't have a phone. I did not get a phone, my own cellular device, until high school -- my birthday before high school, the summer before high school. So, I did not have -- I had to text her on my mom's phone. Trying to keep a secret from both of your parents while also having to text on your parent's phone is -- it was, it was, it was... interesting. Um, but I guess she doesn't count as a rejection, but it still kind of sucked when right after the two-month mark, we -- I was like, doing -- I was sending something to her, talking to her. And it wasn't even that really, like -- it wasn't even anything romantic. Like, we would talk about some romantic stuff, it wasn't even anything romantic. I just like, I said something and then I put a bunch of rainbow heart emojis. And then, suddenly like the tone completely shifts and she's like, "It's okay if you're like that, but I'm not like that. I'm straight," and I was like, "Okayyy? What just happened?" And then I think she said something about, like, "My parents saw my phone, I have to go now." And then I didn't get to hear her -- from her for months. And I kind of consider that's like where the relationship probably like ended, like, when school got out for covid, but, not a rejection, but still kind of sucked.

One time a teacher went off the rails in, I think it was 8th grade. Um, rightfully so. One time, uh, we had a bunch -- we had this little group of boys in our 8th grade class who were insanely annoying troublemakers who didn't try to do anything worthwhile in class, just -- or in school. Just constantly causing trouble. Constantly being annoying, constantly talking, constantly trying to disrupt, um, harass. Just every chance they got, just like always acting out, never being -- never doing their work, never being still and normal. And one day, we were in class and then the teacher for some reason had to leave the room. Just for like two minutes or one minute, it was a very short amount of time. He was like, "I will be right back," and he left for just a second. And one of the boys jumped out of their chairs and said, "Let's destroy the room!" And the other boys were like, "Yeah!" And so, on the spur of the moment, a bunch of boys, and eventually like many other people, got up out of their desks and started destroying the classroom by flipping over all the chairs and desks, throwing papers around. Throwing the chalk and the eraser everywhere, making a bunch of chalk dust. They took the recycle bin and emptied it out and threw the papers all around. They emptied out the garbage can and just dumped it. Started just pulling things off the walls. And, um, I didn't. I sat at my desk and didn't do any of that, 'cause I'm not a bad kid. But I watched everyone else do it. I'm sure there was a few other girls who didn't do anything, but many of the boys did. Maybe a couple of girls did, but it was mainly this little group of boys that had the idea and then did it. And the teacher came back into the room, and he turned beet red and started screaming at everyone and said, "I cannot believe you did this!" You know, just imagine a teacher being very angry. All I can remember -- I can't remember any words that the man said, but I can remember his face 'cause he was like, you know, just kind of this average, like older white man with white hair, and he just turned pink as…

My dad was born in the 1930s, my mom was born in the 1940s, and they really liked country music. Um, so it's like, I grew up familiar with Dolly Parton. But I'm just -- you know, it kind of warms my heart seeing like, everyone on social media, you know, posting about her and talking about her and the nice things that she did. Um, with my parents, I think they liked, you know, like Dolly, they liked the idea of singers because like, back in the day, it seems like, you know, people could come from nothing, you know, like, poor families and then become, you know, become, you know, country rock singers or actresses, actors, and actresses. Things like that. And they can make their own music and kind of have a lot of agency. Um, nowadays, it seems like it's kind of a business and then they're -- you know, they pick these child stars and they kind of own them. Um, so it was very different, like, back then. And, you know, decades ago, most people knew how to play instruments and sing and read music and you know, it was like a community thing. Nowadays, like, you know, I -- very few people know how to like, read music, or make music, or you know play an instrument, let alone like, get a little band together and do that at parties and such, you know? But my parents really liked, you know people like that, Dolly Parton, Loretta Lynn, Johnny Cash. You know, like, real people who had hard upbringings or hard financial situations and stuff and became successful. So that was always very inspiring. So yeah, so that's been a big headline. And I also want to add for the people that are sad. You know? Yeah, it's sad that she passed, um, she was 80. But the idea is, you can't rely on a handful of people to carry everything at all times. So what I'm saying is like, you're supposed to take that inspiration. You know, it goes through you and you pass it on to others. You know? So, um, you know, her love for reading and education and music and loving each other and caring for each other. Pass -- you know, take that into yourself and pass it on. So it's not like it starts and stops with…

My trip was quite uneventful. This was for my aunt's funeral. My aunt was 101. My aunt was the third person in our family to have died at a pretty high age, having recently eaten ice cream before they passed, and while watching TV. We feel very lucky that these people lived these great long lives and that that's how they went. All of it seems -- we are very grateful for the fact that they were not in pain, they did not struggle, they did not -- they were not miserable and their death was very simple and peaceful, and you can't complain about that. But anyway, I went to my aunt's funeral. It was more of a family reunion than a funeral, and was, um, interesting because we all had stories about my aunt to tell. And she had collected dragonfly pins and earrings and necklaces and things. And so my cousin had them, and she gave out one to all of the women and anybody else that wanted to wear them. Some of the men put them on their ties for the funeral. And it was, it was pretty cool. Everybody had one, and it was a nice show of respect to my aunt among other things. I learned so much from my aunt. She was my mother's brother's wife. She's the only aunt I had. My father and my aunt were both only children, and so they had been a set, so to speak, when we were growing up, and they always hung out together. And I had traveled on vacations with my aunt and uncle, um, and my parents but also with my aunt and uncle. My aunt had taught me how to scramble eggs. My aunt had taught me about Hercule Poirot and Agatha Christie. My aunt had taught me something that I use all the time, and that was how to knit. So, um, I, wanted to be there for my cousins and because it was my aunt. So, um, I was happy to go, but boy, I'll tell you, that trip across O'Hare. I was glad I had a carry-on with wheels. And it really went fast and I moved as fast as I could go for a 72 year old. I was surprised, actually, how fast I did it, and I'm glad I'm as in -- in as good of shape…

And there have been times in my career, especially recently, where I’ve had somebody -- I'll just give the more recent example -- they included me on an email thread that I had no business being on because they were trying to flex their muscles by throwing me on it, which is an interesting move given that they don't actually respect me in my role. But they understood the game they were playing with the other people on this thread, and so by including me, it was, in essence, saying, “[Name] was aware. That makes it okay.” I was not aware. It did not make it okay. I never okayed any of this, but they gave this impression from the way they wrote the email, and the way that they included me, that I was somehow a part of whatever was going down. And so I was very quick to nip that in the bud, and said, you know, “I was very unaware I was gonna be CC'd on this email. I have no business being on this email, and I've not been a part of this to date. And here are the people you really should reach out to ‘cause maybe they have more context.” Which were just other men managers. I threw them under the bus quite hard. It blew up in their face quite hard. And my supervisor, who also -- my -- both levels of my supervisors were on the email, and both of them were just like, “Yeah, that was necessary. He was gonna definitely tank you in some way if you didn't speak up.”  So I don't really love to say, like, “Yeah, I throw people under the bus all the time.” No, but I'm very clear. Like, if it's my monkeys, and my circus, sure, I'll take responsibility, but if it's not, I don’t wanna be a part of it, and I'm not gonna sit by and have my reputation and my name attached to something that it shouldn't be, even if it's great. I don't wanna be a part of something I really didn't have anything to do with.

As I've been reading through the papers before shredding them, I have been made very aware of the great impact of inflation -- of raising the cost of everything. As I have been working on the years 1968 to 1970 for the past three days, I noticed that the envelopes that had been through the mail were bearing six cent stamps. That's what it cost to send a one ounce letter through the mail between 1968 and 70.  For one thing, it's impressive that the six cents remained the same over those three years. Today, a one ounce standard first class letter going through the mail cost 82 cents. A forever stamp of 82 cents. That's a lot of inflation.