And so I’ve come to the end of my second week of life on public transportation. Other than not really wanting to wait around for the bus at the end of the day (not that I have a terribly long wait – but it unfortunately precluded the notion of skipping out early yesterday), it hasn’t been too bad. Thursday night was the worst so far. An elderly woman (my age) got run over by a pickup truck and the cops had a bunch of streets closed off, so traffic was terrible and I was almost an hour late getting home (as for the woman, she’s in stable but critical condition in the hospital, so I won’t complain about my slight inconvenience). They also have some streets closed for the Irish Festival (which I would’ve gone over to if I didn’t think walking around would get my feet fired up – I’m feeling a flare-up coming on, so I’m just gonna keep them on ice all weekend and hope they don’t get severely crippling, because that would really suck). Walking around with ice packs strapped to my feet makes me feel a bit like John Turturro in “The Night Of” – which I highly recommend if you haven’t seen it.

I also got lucky on Thursday because we had a brief but powerful monsoon-type storm blow through during the afternoon that caused some flooding. Fortunately it came and went by the time I had to walk to the bus stop, because the crappy little travel umbrella I keep in my backpack wouldn’t have done me much good.

I’d be happy about the weekend getting here if I didn’t have doctor’s appointment next week. Two of them, actually. On Monday I have to go in for blood work, and then it’s my six-month followup on Friday (I really need to see about getting them to do that on the same day, and then they can follow up with a phone call if they find I’ve got something life-threatening or something. Taking the bus makes it a pain in the ass to deal with doctor’s appointments). Anyhow, I’m hoping the six month thing isn’t going to be too intrusive. I just need my BP pill prescription re-upped and then I guess she can tell me I need a colonoscopy, which I have so far avoided. Harbor Freight has a Digital Inspection Camera for $80, so maybe I’ll just do it myself. It says it “fits most spark plug holes” so I should be able to shove it up my ass. But the cable doesn’t look long enough for me to look at the screen while I’m doing it. Good thing the wife’s a nurse.

I didn’t watch whatever it was they were calling the “Commander-in-Chief” dog and pony show on NBC the other night. This is mainly because I cannot stand looking at or listening to either Donald Trump or Matt Lauer. And, seriously, I know they’re a little hard up for actual news people at NBC but Matt Lauer was the best they could do? I don’t know about you, but when I think about foreign policy, Matt the Rat Lauer isn’t a name that jumps into my mind. But if you were expecting Lauer to suck, then you weren’t disappointed, apparently.

Or, as NBC Universal CEO Steve Burke put it:

“Matt did a tremendous job – driving one of the most serious discussions to date on these topics. My deepest thanks to everyone who helped pull off this remarkable achievement.”

Ayup.

And now Trump is aghast at the fact that the interview he did for Larry King’s Russia Today propaganda network was shown to actual Russians. Whoda thunk? Good thing Donny takes every opportunity he gets to kiss Vladimir Putin’s ass. Which is a good idea, because being mean to Putie Put (whether you’re a journalist or a political opponent) gets you dead.

It’s no wonder Dandy Don admires him so much (that and he no doubt owes a boatload of money to Putin’s pals in the Russian Mafia).

Oh well, time to get some more ice on my feet.