It’s been awhile. I’ve been pretty busy lately, mostly just walking my ass off, literally. I have lost 45 lbs since the first of the year, which feels great. It’s been really difficult and consumes a lot of my free time I’d really rather spend doing other things I like, but I consider it an investment. If I can get all the way down to a weight that is considered “non-obese” it could potentially add years to my life. Every pound I lose hopefully gives me some more time, and I’d like to live longer than what the statistics predict.

According to the experts, diabetics with Type 2, which is me, have a life expectancy of 77 years. Strangely enough, my father was also diabetic and he lived to – you guessed it – 77. My grandfather George Trottier died at 76. I want to at least pass them all up and clear 80. This is a good start. Of course, the closer and closer I get, I could start to feel differently. For now, just feeling so much better, and having the ability to do so much more, is pretty good incentive in itself.

I work in a hospital, so I was one of the first to be offered the CODIV-19 vaccine awhile back, and I got it as soon as I could. The possibility of a strange reaction to it or other side-effect, or the possibility of something bizarre like the weird things that some people are actually claiming are contained in the vaccine are just so minimal that, for me at least, it was a no-brainer. Why would you pass up a chance to possibly prevent your death or a serious illness? Especially if it’s completely free? The government is willing to pay for it. And now, since we can’t reach the “her immunity” numbers because so many people haven’t gotten the vaccine and it has mutated, the government is finally cracking down further and will soon make it a requirement for government employees. If you don’t get vaccinated, you will be subjected to frequent COVID-19 testing. That seems reasonable to me.

It should have been mandatory from the beginning. I know, easier said from someone who doesn’t oppose vaccines for religious reasons and doesn’t subscribe to the conspiracy and hoax theories and everything, but that’s just me. I want to live. Period.

But back to me. It’s all about me, isn’t it? Anyway, because all of this time spent walking, I need something to occupy me a lot of the time, so they don’t feel so long and boring. And since I’m also into music, movies and TV, I try to incorporate some of that into my walks whenever possible. Instead of counting each step from 1 to 10,000 during a walk, I’ll put in my earbuds and play a TV show episode, a movie, some music, or even just put on one of Howard Stern’s amazing celebrity interviews.

The latter usually ends up prompting me to pull out my phone while walking, bring up my notetaking app, and taking a few notes when the celebrity explains something interesting in a movie to TV show, or mentions good shows or movies or actors. I even sometimes dive through that rabbit hole while I’m walking, which can get pretty dicey, especially if there’s traffic and other people in the vicinity. Yeah, I’m “that guy”, distracted by his phone, buried in the screen and not paying attention. If I’m crossing a street or forced to walk in the street though, I’m heads-up, phone down. I’m not that bad. I want to live, after all. And if I am playing a TV show or movie, it’s just the audio I’m listening to, not the video. That’s just crazy right there. Watch video and walking I can’t do. I just don’t have the coordination for that. Maybe if Ready Player One-style glasses were real, and I could pull up a display in my peripheral vision while still looking and walking forward, it might be doable, but for now, no.

I was just about to detail my latest notes I’ve taken on new movies and shows I’ve noted, since I’m supposed to “write what I know”, but I’m on-call for the hospital this weekend and I just got paged. I’ll be back…