Box of Rocks

I've done more stupid shit in the last three days, more like three weeks, actually it's been more like three months, made some genius fucking moves and have cost myself more money than I could've ever anticipated. I guess it's a "stupid tax" in a way, paying for mistakes.

I think I've done my due diligence, research, hours of contemplating, taking notes and advice from my contemporaries and still manage to ram my head into the wall at full steam. Dad always said I was about as smart as a box of rocks.

My forte is getting caught in the money pit. Making what seems are logical choices at the time only to wind up in the end realizing I could've saved myself time and money had I not tried to save myself money. In an effort to save money, I cost myself twice as much.

That would be bad enough except for the fact that sometimes I'm too stupid to know that I'm doing it wrong until somebody comes along and points out the obvious. I'm really good at missing the obvious. It's as frustrating as setting something down and then tripping over it 10 seconds later. Happens a lot setting up music equipment.

Like a lot of artistic types, I lack expertise or the discipline for fiduciary matters. It may not feel like work when you do something you love, but when you're a musician/moron, it also doesn't pay like work. Dad always said music ain't no way to make a living. I guess it depends what your definition of living is...

I find myself existing in a world where everything is spying on me, listening to everything I say, tracking everywhere I go, everything I buy, everything I research or think about buying, it knows my spending habits, how much money I have in my bank account, my on time payment record, all the way down to the color of the automobiles that we own... Targeted marketing is one word for it.

My Apple Watch thinks it knows my routine so well that it tells me how long it's going to take to get to where it thinks I'm going when I get in the truck and start to go somewhere. And once I get there, it tells me how long it'll take to get back home.

I'm sure everyone has experienced talking about something and then getting ads for that thing in their Facebook feed or Google ads and the like. It's damn near impossible to live in the modern world without a credit card and a cell phone. Our whole lives are attached to our cell phone numbers almost as rigorous as our Social Security number. If you frequently change phone numbers nowadays, it confounds your entire existence.

What I don't understand is how many times does somebody need to steal my information? My information is already out there so the only thing I can do is try to protect myself from bad actors by having the credit lock and identity freezes turned on at the credit reporting bureaus. The very people that you would think would be interested in protecting us as returning consumers instead of saying too bad, pay us. We're over the barrel so we have no choice but to take it wherever they want to stick it.

And why is my information worth more to everybody else than it is to me? I've had to unlock my credit several times while we prepare to relocate. Another odd sensation in the modern age is the feeling of being vulnerable when you unlock your credit. That was something I didn't even consider in my 20s, 30s and 40s, wasn't really until my 50s when identity theft became a thing.

I actually had a change of address that I did not apply for show up in my mailbox. I almost threw it away because it looked like junk mail with all the advertising for moving supplies. I opened it up and realized somebody was trying to change my address to a Tampa address.

That was several years ago and I still haven't heard back from the postmaster inspector general's office as to whether or not they made an arrest. They wouldn't give me the address in Tampa for fear of the possibility I would seek revenge. That's what they said anyway.

My eyes suck pretty bad and it's hard for me to distinguish certain letters and numbers from each other especially in today's small fucking print on everything. Can't read the back of a pill bottle for nothing. Fives and sixes look alike and that's with my good reading glasses on. Three and eight are easily confused with the astigmatism...

I order the wrong things or sizes because my brain misinterprets the information from my eyes. A beautiful woman gets mad at me for staring and I'm just trying to focus. The worse my eyes get, the better my imagination becomes. The older I get, the more younger women there are to look at, too.

Oh well, for fucks sake's, what can I do? Keep pulling the plow, that's all I know.

This is what happens when you mistake a five for a six. Notice the gap  between the topper and the tailgate. Ordered it off the internet. Came from New Jersey on an 18 wheeler. I wrestled with it for six hours assembling it. Took four grown men to lift it onto the truck before I realized my mistake. Genius! I'm in negotiations for returning it or selling it, I'm not sure which will happen. If it goes like usual I will probably end up giving it away along with the $$$$ I paid for the damn thing. I got brains I ain't even used yet.