What's a Delmer Look Like?

In a similar vein, let me just say I've been kicking computer ass this week. I will not go into details, as that could bring the whole thing down. And I'm not even going to think on it too much. Let's just say it's been a good week

In a dissimilar vein -- totally unrelated to the universe and jinx's -- I shaved last night. I was curious about what I looked like. I was getting ready to take a bike ride and thought sun on the face would be nice.

I think the February photo looks better. Sammo can brighten any shot

Posted by delmer at 12:08 PM | Comments (4)

April 20, 2006

Insomnia

The weeks I don't have the boys I don't set an alarm.  I can flex in and out of work and I'm normally there by 9 a.m. no matter what.  Some days it's as early as 6 a.m.

This morning I had a doctor's appointment at 9 a.m.  I wasn't real worried about missing it -- the morning sun shines brightly through my bedroom window and I was confident it would get me up. I decided to not set an alarm.

I went to bed at 11:30 p.m.  At 2 a.m. I was up -- I hadn't been to sleep yet and realized that lying in bed was not doing me any good.  I decided to get up, have some milk, and watch a little bit of Rooster Cogburn.

At 3 a.m. I was back in bed.

If only I didn't have that 9 o'clock appointment with the doctor, I thought I'd push the dresser in front of the window, block out the light, and sleep until 10.

Four hours later it was 7 o'clock and I was up. I was at work by 7:30.  At 8:40 I left for my appointment and was there ten minutes later.  At 9 a.m. she stuck her head out into the hall, gave me a look, and said, "Delmer, I have you down for 9 a.m. tomorrow."

I checked my Timex Data Link watch: I had me down for 9 a.m. tomorrow too.

Posted by delmer at 3:42 PM | Comments (0)

April 19, 2006

I am a weight-loss Guru

Somebody named Brad left this comment:

If you have ever read my blog you will note that the only weight loss guruness I have involves being treated for a pituitary tumor. The tumor screwed with my testosterone, I couldn't drop weight, etc. Despite Brad's compliment, I doubt my content is very interesting for most people. (As a matter of fact, while I'm thankful for it, I can't believe my content is so interesting that you've read even this far.)

I also had absolutely no libido and ED. Not that the ED troubled me; I didn't notice as, according to the last sentence, I had absolutely no libido. (Before we go any further, let me say that if you are a male, your sex drive has tanked, you've gained weight and can't lose it to save your life, you might want to get your testosterone level checked.) The low testosterone also brought with it other problems that I may or may not go into later.

The point to the above rant is that if I have kick-ass weight-loss tips, I also have kick-ass low-sex-drive tips. I would be all things to all people. At least fat men with no sex drive.

But I'm not.

I had considered deleting Brad's comment and going about my life. Instead I shot over to his site to have a look around. I was surprised ... there is actually some good content there. Some well-thought-out content. Content with a capital C ... that rhymes with P ... and that stands for Pool.

Ahhh. But I sensed trouble in River City. And not just with the weak Music Man transitional element.

I noticed the Google Ads banner and feared that Brad might be borrowing copyrighted material in order to make a buck.

Ahhh! And not like the above Ahhh, which was more like a calm relaxing aaaahhh (think the kid on Daddy Day Care who gets a payoff of a couple dollars.)

Ahhh! (as a scream you make when an unsettling realization sets in) I really don't want to create links to Brad's site. Looks like you'll have to do some work. If you were so inclined you could cut and paste the following into your browser.

http://fast-weightloss.blogspot.com/2006/04/lose-weight-with-healthy-food.html

As you read along you will notice articles similar to:

Jennifer Murray's Eat Healthy and Lose Weight

Michael Ben's The Easiest Ways to Lose Weight

And The Blame Game and Obesity in America, which is an AP story at cbsnews.com.

I said similar to. Is there a stronger comparison that would keep me from getting into any trouble in the way saying a direct rip off of might?

My apologies to the regulars here at What's a Delmer Look Like. I don't normally play Internet Cop. I do have just over 20 times the amount of testosterone that I used to have (it actually oozes from my fingertips and has ruined more than one keyboard) and people I perceive as opportunists piss me off a little faster than they used to.

In closing some tips:

Weight loss: Eat less. Exercise more. If that doesn't work, and you are really trying, get your hormones checked. (I am not belittling your struggle, read some of my old posts if you are new here.)

No Libido: Have your testosterone checked.

Depression, unexplained weight gain, inability to lose and keep off weight, loss of muscle mass, erectile dysfunction, lacking a "lust for life": Get your testosterone checked.

See guys and gals. I'm pretty much a one-trick pony. There are no cutting-edge weight loss tips here.

Posted by delmer at 11:11 AM | Comments (3)

April 18, 2006

The Benchwarmers

The boys and I went to see The Benchwarmers last night. I snuck or sneaked out of work early.

Reviews have been mixed -- at least those that I spent a minute looking for -- and I'll have to admit I didn't expect much.

My first thought was that it was nice to see a bunch of SNL guys in a movie that didn't totally suck. A little further into the movie I decided it was really fairly good. If the boys wanted to see it again, I'd go again (which is my version of one thumb up).

In other news, Haydn sees the doctor today about his knee. We're hoping he'll be taken off crutches.

Posted by delmer at 9:24 AM | Comments (3)

April 17, 2006

My sweet ride

I have a 1999 Dodge Caravan. Not just a Caravan ... a Grand Caravan. Quite possibly the grandest of them all.

Several months ago I felt what I thought was a transmission shudder. It had to be the transmission; I had a new engine dropped in it under two years ago and it was still under warranty. The transmission was the only real expensive thing left to break (The AC went last summer and as I don't typically get $1200 worth of uncomfortable over the course of an AC season it remains broken.)

Time would pass. The shudder rarely reappeared. And when it did it would have a feel to it that seemed almost engine like. And then familiar things would happen ... the problem turned into a miss that was most definitely worse when it was wet outside. I was coming around to the thought that it might be plugs and wires.

Then there was the day it was raining hard outside and the van ran oh so smooth. Hmmm. So much for applying 1980's logic to something so complex ... so grand ... as my mini van.

The problem came and went. A 90-minute drive from Cincinnati had me feeling like I was on a mechanical bull. The next day things were fine. The Service Engine Soon light would come on ... but it would always go back off. Soon by whose standards?

The problem eventually evolved into something that was always there -- even at idle -- though the severity would go from not horrible to worrisome.

I decided I'd change the plugs, at least the three I could reach, and bought several. If it was a plug problem I had a 50% chance of fixing it.

And then. And then. And then, I sort of backed off that idea. I'm a 45-year old man. Was that sensible thinking? The car needed an oil change and tire rotation and was going to go into the shop for that anyway. I thought I'd have the mechanic plug it into the computer and read the error code. With luck something under warranty would need replaced. I wouldn't have to embarrassingly admit I'd changed three plugs like the hillbilly I am.

More time would pass. Three hours to be exact. The guy from the shop called -- I was misfiring on #4 cylinder and needed new plugs ($79.00) new wires ($76.00) plus installation ($38.00) and the injectors could use a cleaning ($75.00) ... I'm missing something here as the total was $450.00.

Whoa.

"Ah, let's not do that," I said. "Just change the oil and charge me for the diagnostic." I'd just put new rotors and brake pads on and had just replaced a tire. That had run me $150, and $600 over the course of a week is more than I wanted to spend.

As it happens #4 cylinder is one I can get to. The next day I bought plug wires -- $26.00 -- and installed them and three spark plugs.

One of the plug wires came apart in my hands as I pulled it off the plug. I'm not sure of the cylinder numbering scheme, but I'm inclined to think it was #4.

The engine stutter is gone.

As soon as I can find a closed course I'm going to hire a professional driver and have this baby put through her paces with some Zep playing hard and loud in the background.

Posted by delmer at 10:25 AM | Comments (1)

April 16, 2006

Testosterone and Weight

As I mentioned, not too long ago, I’ve dropped 120 pounds over the past 4 years -- since January 2003. Which makes it more like 3 years and just under 4 months. I seem to have a problem with math.

I would prefer to go through life somewhat anonymously -- err, um ... so, naturally I set up a blog; yes, I see the contradiction. What I mean to say is that I prefer to go through life anonymously as it pertains to receiving compliments.

The other day I was at my doc’s and one of the gals who pokes me periodically said, “You’ve lost more weight. You look thin.”

“Thank you?” I said. And when it came out I knew it sounded like a question. Which was an incredible improvement over just stammering.

A moment later the gal stuck her head around the corner and told me she’d meant it as a compliment. I told her I knew but that I had trouble taking them. She said she'd noticed that about me before.

I’m trying to be better about it.

People always seem to want to know how a person has lost weight and it isn’t uncommon for someone to ask if it was hard. And, while I don’t want to belittle anyone else’s weight loss problems, or disappoint those asking me if it was hard, well, it really wasn’t. And, it would seem to have been easy enough that I thought it took a whole eight months longer than it has.

What was hard was trying to lose weight and not getting anywhere. For more than a year I went to the gym religiously and took strolls regularly without managing to lose any weight at all. Which is probably not the absolute truth -- I know there were periods of weight loss. Nothing big, though, and nothing I kept off. I was trying pretty hard and getting nowhere at all.

In August of 2002 an MRI turned up two pituitary tumors. The tumors caused hormone problems -- high prolactin which caused a low testosterone condition.

I started taking Bromocriptine (Parlodel) in August. It didn’t do anything to help the hormones out and I was switched to Dostinex.

I weighed 370 pounds in December of 2002. Dostinex seemed to work on my hormone problem right off the bat, which was good. As my hormones started coming in line I started losing weight, which was unexpected. While I’d hoped my hormone problem was the cause of my inability to lose weight (and part of the reason for the weight gain) I was afraid that it may have been age related. As a matter of fact, until the tumors were found I thought my weight might have been responsible for the hormone problem, which I’d known about since July of 2001.

(It was the year between July 2001 and August 2002 that I tried hard to lose weight without any success. I'm not a big drug taker and hoped that the weight loss would lead to a normalization of hormones. While excess body fat can can cause some hormone problems, it would have been nothing like what I experienced)

By mid-June of 2003 I’d lost 40 pounds -- doing the same things I’d done before. By the end of the year I was down 60. Then another 40 the following year. It took more than a year to drop the next twenty.

Ahh. What about that 20? Even though I didn't drop a whole big bunch of weight, I did drop several pants sizes.

Low testosterone can lead to loss of bone mass and loss of muscle mass. I am guessing that the increase in testosterone lead to an increase in muscle mass -- that is, after all, why people take performance-enhancing drugs. Muscle weighs more than fat. So, I probably lost some fat and gained some muscle as my hormones returned to normal human-being male levels. I don't know how much ... I don't know that I'm right.

These are just my experiences. I'm a sample of one.

Posted by delmer at 8:36 PM | Comments (0)

April 15, 2006

Low Testosterone -- Pituitary Tumor

This is a pituitary tumor / high prolactin / low testosterone post, put here to help others who might stumble across it. It may not be all that interesting for the usual What's a Delmer Look Like crowd. Still, feel free to read on.

For the sake of clarification, I may or may not have a prolactinoma. A prolactinoma is a pituitary tumor that secretes prolactin. I have a tumor (two actually) that, until treatment, caused my prolactin to be high -- and, therefore, my testosterone to be low, my endocrinologist is uncertain as to whether or not it is secreting prolactin or causing the problem in some other way; prolactinomas typically cause higher prolactin levels than I hit.

Prolactin suppresses testosterone. If a man's prolactin is too high it can lead to low testosterone levels all the time. My prolactin was too high. (Prolactin has other uses -- we're not concerned with those.)

Let's start with the end. That was the thing I was most interested in when I found out I had low testosterone caused by a pituitary tumor.

How would things likely end up?
In my case everything is good. I currently take 1.5 mg of Dostinex twice a week. The pills are about the size of Tic Tacs and, without insurance, would run me about $950.00 a month. I pay $45.00 monthly. I take three pills on Sunday and three on Thursday.

Bromocriptine (Parlodel), another treatment, would have cost $7.00 monthly. I've forgotten what it would have run without insurance. It was well under the cost of the Dostinex. Parlodel didn't do anything for me, though I've read accounts of people having very good success with it after just a week of use. We're all different.

One of my friends is in his early 30's and has been diagnosed with high blood pressure. He's not in bad physical condition, though he's had to step up his exercise regimen in order to help bring the BP down some. I take less medication than he does.

Would my hormone levels would continue to improve even after my Dostinex leveled out?
That is, if taking 1.5 mg of Dostinex twice a week brought my prolactin down to x ng/mL, would it stay at x ng/mL or would it continue to drop. I've been taking 1.5 mg since February 2004 and my prolactin has decreased each of the six blood draws I've had since then. (As a matter of fact, in the week or more that passed since I started writing this, and today, my Dostinex has been dropped to 1.25 mg twice a week.)

How long would it take for my hormones to straighten out?
My first normal testosterone reading came in October 2003, after I'd been on Dostinex for about 9 months. I started Bromocriptine in August of 2002 -- so it took more than a year after I started taking meds. And in this case normal meant I was in the normal range for all men -- from 18 to 100 years old (I'm not sure of the age range, but I'll bet that's close.); I was at the low end of normal and not at the level a man of my age should be.

My prolactin didn't fall into the normal range until June of 2004 -- almost two years after I started taking medication.

Two years is a long time when you're trying to sort your life out. The good news is I know of other who have had very good responses to meds and have had normal hormone readings in just a week or two.

Posted by delmer at 11:01 PM | Comments (0)

April 14, 2006

Chase can see into the future

This is obviously Phishing but take a look. Please note that Today is April 14:

Your online credit card account has high-risk activity status. We are contacting you to remind that on April 18 2006 our Account Review Team identified some unusual activity in your account. In accordance with Chase Bank User Agreement and to ensure that your account has not been compromised, access your account was limited. Your account access will remain limited until this issue has been resolved.

We encourage you to log in and perform the steps necessary to restore your account access as soon as possible. Allowing your account access to remain limited for an extended period of time may result in further limitations on the use of your account and possible account closure.
Login to your limit account and restore online access:

https://fake_address_goes_here/

This notification is part of the All-Electronic Program you enrolled in to receive your activity report online.

Posted by delmer at 10:08 PM | Comments (1)

April 13, 2006

Thumbs in the Air

Picking up where we left off ...

Marketing people will quickly point out that part of any successful sales campaign in the packaging of the product. Presentation is often the key to success or failure.

Anybody on the street will tell you that some things look better in bigger packages ... beer, Doritos, chips (generally all of your snack foods), and breasts (to an extent), while other things look better in smaller packages ... boot-ays, the French (according to one of my British coworkers), and dishevelment.

Having been ripping down the road at 80 mph with the windows down, Tom, Dick, Sherry and I were likely at the peak of our disheveledness. I had also not yet picked up on the finer points of beard trimming and had sort of a wild growh on my face. And I'll bet I had not bathed. Or brushed my teeth. (Fortunately, as I'd been sucking gas out of the fuel line, bad breath was not going to be a problem for me.

Sherry, while equally disheveled, was packaged better. She's five foot one and three quarters ("because when you're this short every quarter inch counts," she would tell me years later) and didn't have the surface area necessary to look really messy. Also, she's a girl, and girls just make looking unkempt work ... somehow. I'm guessing she had a toothbrush in her purse, too.

"I'll bet we could hitchhike," Sherry said.

"OK, But you need to stand in front so passersby can see that I'm with a girl." And it's not just some big, sloppy goon here.

With her laundry in front of us and Sherry closest to approaching traffic we stuck our thumbs in the air. In just a minute or two someone stopped. My recollection is that it was a guy in a pickup truck with a child.

We threw the laundry in the bed of the truck and headed up the road. Tom and Dick saw us coming and waved.

We waved back.

Either Tom or Dick had to get to Cincinnati Airport (located conveniently in Kentucky ... which means we must have broken down in Kentucky), to pick up his girlfriend; whichever one I designated as Al in yesterday's installment. They would eventually make it, smelling of gas, and with no car to transport the lovely Cathy home.

Sherry and I had to get to Springboro. We would eventually make it as well.

We got several rides and found that people that picked strangers up liked to talk. A lot. Sherry eventually started creating secondary stories to go along with our hitchhiking, not so much because bailing out of a burning Beetle lacked excitement, but, just because. We were picked up by the guy in the pickup, a guy in an 18-wheeler and a guy in a station wagon; this last guy was the most talkative. There may have been another ride or two in there; we never had to wait long between cars.

One of the hitchhikees let us out near Mason. I knew that Al's mom worked at a bank near the exit and Sherry and I thought we'd hike over to see if she'd heard anything from her son. I know what you're thinking ... what a brilliant move! Al's mom had not heard anything from her son -- his running from a burning vehicle caught her by surprise. Sherry and I assured her that we were certain Al was fine and there was nothing to worry about. I'm sure out appearance put her at ease more than even our words were able to. We hiked back to the on-ramp.

This may be where the guy in the station wagon picked us up.

I was certain that when we got close to Springboro that someone we knew would give us a lift. I was right. Our last ride was with Suitcase Simpson. He'd gone to high school with Sherry and I knew him from Miami University, Middletown (that's MUM y'all). We loaded up the laundry, hopped in, and we were off.

We eventually caught up with Tom and Dick. Sherry got her laundry done.

We all lived happily ever after.

(I know I promised a story involving The Man this week. But in order to maintain some sort of sense with respect to timelines, this story had to come first.)

The Bruise was eventually towed home. Dave Steinbach helped me rewire it -- he called off colors from another bug's wiring harness and I made connections in The Bruise using all white wires. At one point Dave asked for some help identifying one of the wires. My memory is that he said, "Del, I need help with this one. I think it's green, but it may have some grease on it."

It was clean and brown. And that's when I remembered that Dave was color blind.

Oh well. When all was said and done, The Bruise ran.

Posted by delmer at 5:55 PM | Comments (0)

April 12, 2006

On the Road to Springboro

As we continue with The Thugs Take a Road Trip ... Tom, Dick, Sherry and I loaded into The Bruise and shot off for Eastern Kentucky University in Richmond. We may or may not have had an uneventful drive on the way down. It's hard to remember as the trip to EKU and the time we spent there was sort of overshadowed by the trip home. So let's fast forward to that.

Kentucky, as you can see is a very green state criss-crossed with just a few highways, byways, and cart paths. We would spend most of our trip to Springboro (remember, we had to drop off Sherry so she could do her laundry) on I-75. And a lot of that time on the shoulder.

As I mentioned in yesterday's entry The Bruise had a fuel-delivery problem; at least that's what I think now; back in '82 I wasn't sure what it was.  The symptom was that the car would sometimes just quit running -- it would start chugging and slowing down until it eventually died.  Days or weeks might pass between these episodes but the fix was always the same -- I'd wait it out.

As we drove home from EKU the problem reared it's ugly head as it never had before. We had to keep the car floored to keep it running at all.  We would pretty much rip up the highway at 80 mph (back when 55 was the speed limit) until the car quit running.  Waiting it out really wasn't an option on this trip, so we'd pull off a fuel line, partially fill 12-ounce bottle we had with us, and then dump the gasoline right into thecarburetorr.

Then we'd be back on the road doing 80. Working in this manner we were passing everybody on I-75. Up until the car quit running, then they'd pass us. But we'd eventually pass them again.

There we were, roaring along. Al, uh, Dick was in the passenger seat while Jeff, uh, Tom, and Sherry were in the back. 

A little bit of smoke came out of the heater vents. This was surprising -- if you know anything about Beetles you know that having anything  remotely resembling something hot coming out of the heater vents is uncommon.

"We're on fire!" screamed Dick.

"No we're not," I replied calmly.

"Pull over!"  As Dick finished that statement, well exclamation according to the punctuation I've used, the gas pedal gave up any pretense of having any spring to it and dropped flat to the floor. It would soon be revealed that the spring mechanism on thecarburetorr had sort of melted.

I didn't really pull over so much as limp over but, in any case, I made the berm.

She's gonna blow  is not only an excellent title for a porno movie but is often the thing people yell in moments of panic ... when they think something might blow up. Would you care to guess who might of said that?  Did you say Dick or even Al?  His response to this whole thing still puzzles me. Dick/Al was never one to panic.

"She's gonna blow!" screamed Al as he threw open his door and headed up a bank.

Sherry, Tom/Jeff and I exited the car a bit more sedately, though with some haste..

She's gonna blow  played over and over in my mind as Sherry and I slowly backed away from The Bruise. Was she gonna blow? Did Al know what he was talking about? He'd watched the Dukes of Hazard on a regular basis ... things were blowing up all the time there. 

As Sherry and I were retreating Dick made his way to the back of The Bruise and put up the trunk.  He beat out the flames with a shirt ending our little drama.

We regrouped. Tom and Dick said they were going to start walking to the next exit while Sherry and I retrieved her laundry.  The boys weren't too terribly far ahead of us before we had Sherry's laundry bag in hand.

Before we started walking Sherry looked over at me and said, "I think we could hitchhike."

Posted by delmer at 4:25 PM | Comments (2)

April 11, 2006

The Thugs take a Road Trip

Miami University, Oxford, Ohio.
Junior Year: 1982.

It was Friday afternoon and two of the Thugs, we'll call them Tom and Dick to protect their identities, and I decided a road trip might be a good idea. Our friend, Roy, was going to Eastern Kentucky University in Richmond, Kentucky, and we picked him as our target destination.

Prior to departing we drove by Sherry and Lois' dorm.

I'm not sure why we stopped by. We weren't all big buds with the girls or anything at this point in time, but we thought Sherry might want to go. We were likable guys (we still are)! what girl wouldn't want to road trip with us? Aside from Lois?

[I'm certain that Lois will back me up when I say that she didn't particularly care for me at that point in time and I'm not sure she knew Tom and Dick yet. She would eventually marry Roy. (An example of my awareness that Lois didn't care for me: Roy had road tripped to Miami to visit me and told me he needed to meet a girl. I remember telling him he was out of luck as the only girls I could think of were Sherry and Lois and Lois didn't really like me. Hmmm .... If Roy needed to meet a girl, had he really come to see me? )]

Anyway, non-nagging female companionship always makes road trip a little better.

Sherry was not a nagger. But, as I recall, wasn't anxious to go. She wasn't hesitant either; she just had things to do. One of those things was laundry and she decided she'd make the trip if she could bring her dirty clothes along. Why not? Tom, Dick and I told her we'd drop her by her house on the way back to MU so her things could be washed.

We took The Bruise, my primer black and faded-light-blue Beetle of late 1960's vintage. It was a really sweet ride. About as sweet as you'd expect anyway. I'd mounted speakers in the front doors and had speakers behind the back seat mounted on a homemade deck so they were flush at back-seat height. I'd removed the AM radio and in the hole put a graphic equalizer; when the windshield wipers were on the wiper mechanism would rub up against the equalizer and cause it to rock up and down in its mounting. Talk about pimped out!

The Bruise had an electrical problem that I'd spent a lot of hours trying to sort through (Dad would eventually sort it out in about 5 minutes). If too many electrical things were turned on at one time the car would shut down. It took a while to figure that out as, for the longest while, it seemed the car was just instantly dying sometimes; and not just dying in an engine-has-quit-running sense, I mean everything shut down. One of the keys to the electrical part -- and I'm no electrician ... I'm not good with amp vs volts etc. -- came as I drove home one night. I'd turned on to our driveway and, as was the custom, had the radio blaring. I was listening to Jay Ferguson's Shakedown Cruise -- think of the opening notes, bars, musical stabs, whatever you want to call them (I'm no musician either) -- and noticed that my headlights were dimming/brightening to the beat. It was really cool; probably not really good.

The Bruise also had what I recently identified as a fuel delivery problem. I'm certain, now, many years later, that the problem could be tied some sort of charcoal-filled canister that was under the hood and part of the fuel system. Not long ago the guys on Car Talk got a call from a Thing owner who had a problem with the same symptoms The Bruise had. The canister gizmo was gummed up and wasn't allowing the tank to vent so fuel wouldn't flow in the needed amount. Something like that. Anyway, the guy's Thing would die and whenever the guy took the gas cap off he'd hear a sucking sound like air was rushing in. The Bruise had the same problem and feature.

Let's see what we have here. Me. Tom, Dick and Sherry. And a sweet black and blue old VW Beetle that was not known for its reliability. This is a scenario that just screamed ROAD TRIP.

Who were we to stand in the way of scenarios?

Off we went.

(In all fairness to us, I'm certain the electrical problem had been sorted out by this time. I'm certain. I remember that dad had it fixed months before the fire.)

Posted by delmer at 8:46 PM | Comments (1)

April 10, 2006

The Pituitary Disclaimer

Thrice.

Man, I wish I could work with that and sort of give this entry a John Kerry feel. But I can't. So, we'll go with this:

I can think of three oddball problems I've had that I've found solutions for on the Internet. Now, I freely admit I find solutions to problems almost daily via the Internet, but the three problems I'm thinking of were problems most people would never have.

One solution involved setting up Ray's Mail Filter for Sendmail. It was one of my first Linux projects and it was wearing me down. I found a HowTo page at a university that some guy had put up just in case someone else could use it. It was a detailed step-by-step walk through of what I needed.

Another solution involved ... what was it? ... something to do with IRIX 6.2. This was about seven yeas ago. Anyway, I found a kick-ass HowTo tucked away in one of the dark corners of someone's website. (A trip to Achive.org and a look at one of my old pages reveals that I had found a page detailing how to set up SAMBA shares on a SGI box running IRIX 6.2.)

Hmmm. The trip to Archive.org suggests that the third problem I thought I'd solved by finding an obscure web page may have actually been a solution I'd posted in an obscure page I used to keep. Way back ... among the 1999-era stories about my kids on the original www.delmer.com.

The point of this whole entry is that sometimes people put up web pages that they know will get little viewership. Most people won't need the info shared in those pages. The pages never get updated and they aren't pretty. But, once in a while someone will stumble across one of those pages and find it to be the thing that solves an immediate problem -- the thing that saves the reader hours of time -- the thing that points them in the right direction -- the thing that answers a bothersome question.

This week we will start discussing my pituitary tumor a little more often. I have answers to some questions I couldn't find answers to before I started treatment and I'm putting them up for the one or two people who might find them useful; the rest of you will have to suffer. I'll try to make it up to you by posting another story about me, the thugs, and the man sometime this week.

Posted by delmer at 9:14 PM | Comments (1)

April 9, 2006

Do these jeans make the Internet look really small?

I woke up feeling really good.

There seems to be enough virus left in me that the act of showering wore me down a bit. In all fairness, I'm sort of tall and there's a lot to wash. Fortunately, I'm a man and don't see much need in spending a lot of time drying off -- I let nature take care of most of that for me.

I took a break for a while and started feeling groovy again, so I decided to take a look at the flat tire my really sweet mini-van is sporting. I started dumping some Fix-A-Flat (the new, non-flammable formula) into the tire and felt pretty good as the tire started to rise.

The hiss the can made as it emptied was soon drowned out by the hiss the tire made as it, too, started emptying.

I have a cut in the sidewall.

I'm smart enough to realize I'm not near 100%. I'm not going to the gym today. I'm not going to take a stroll. I'm not going to change a tire.

I'm going to lay around and rest some more.

Maybe I'm going to lie around.

Do people lay and things lie? Or is it the other way around?

As it happens I scored 100% on this Lay/Lie test. If you have a cat or an egg-laying chicken I'm the go-to guy if you want to know what they're up to when it comes to laying or lying.

Recently I'm sure I saw the phrase people lie, things lay, though it may have been people lay, things lie. And, by God, before this entry is over we'll know which one it was. And, by Mohammad (just to give everybody a chance), in the interest of grammar honesty I think we'll find it was people lie, things lay. Which means I'm going to spend the day lying around.

While Googling for the phrase people lie, things lay I found Amber's Blog. I recognized her as a reader from another blog I visit -- The Daily Slacker -- as she has a Deputy Slacker badge on her site. If you consider that there are millions of blogs out there it would seem amazing to Google across the blog of someone who reads another blog you read. If there were only thirty or so blogs it wouldn't be that uncommon at all. I'm inclined to believe, despite all the hype, there are only about thirty ... maybe fifty or 100 ... (far fewer than millions) of blogs in existence. There's mine, yours, the one's I've linked to in my sidebar, and the ones you've blog rolled. The millions, I'm sure, will some day turn out to be nothing more than bad intel passed on by the CIA to George W Bush, who, despite being sworn to secrecy by Spanky McFarland of the He Man Woman Haters Club, let it leak that there were millions. Like millions of Americans (actual millions), GWB was lost as to how something like that could have gotten out. Then he remembered it was him.

So. In George's case, we know he lies.

What about the rest of us. In the comments for Amber's entry someone had written People lie and other things lay which is what I think I was looking for.

Why is this entry so long and boring? You ask. As I'm typing and trying to Google up links my Internet connection is coming and going. It leaves a lot of time for these pointless asides. Ah. All the lights are on again.

The key to the whole thing, as usual, was supplying the correct search term: "people lie" +"things lay" cranked out hit after hit.

Posted by delmer at 2:51 PM | Comments (1)

April 8, 2006

Lee Jeans Responds

You may recall from Clothing Quandary that I was wondering whether jeans sizes have changed over the years. That is, is a 34-inch waist from 1986 the same as a 34-inch waist in 2006.

During my sickness this week I've had some moments of lucidity. Well, I've been lucid all the time, but I've had some moments of non-headpoundingness ... during one of those times I cranked off a letter to Lee Jeans and asked if Vanity Sizing applied to men's jeans.

Their reply is a little longer than the above.

I'm not really as hung up on this as I sound. I've just had time to think and be curious.

Posted by delmer at 3:25 PM | Comments (0)

April 7, 2006

One more sick thing

After college -- and this was the event that lead me to realize I was not indestructible -- I was hospitalized with a high fever. I won't go into all the details up to being hospitalized but I'd been sick for a few days.

My GP had referred me to a urologist. Why? I can't remember.

I do remember that the day I had the appointment my old college roomie stopped by. He was going job searching and wondered if I wanted to go. I told him I had a doc's appointment -- he decided to blow of the job hunt and take me to the doctor.

On the way into the office I asked my roomie what the outside temperature was like. He said it was hot. I was freezing; not the best sign.

The urologist must have done some other things but all I remember was him taking my temp. And the thing I remember about that was the part where the doc stuck his finger up my rectum. He was an older guy -- maybe he was doing this to double check the new fangled thermometer he'd used just a moment before.

"It feels like an oven in there," he said. "

That's funny. It feel like a finger from this end" I thought.

My temperature was high enough that he thought I should check into the hospital.

My old roomie drove me to Middletown Hospital.

My next memory is of climbing into a bed and telling the nurse, Wilma, that you might as well start liking me now because by the time I leave I'm going to be your favorite patient. That is important to know because it showed I had a sense of humor at that point. I was also strolling around and don't recall feeling like my head was about to explode.

I also had a temperature of almost 105. It was at least 104.8 and could have been dead-on 105.

I was in the hospital for two weeks. The docs never sorted out what I had though they were able to eliminate a lot of things I didn't have. My stay was attributed to FUO (fever of unknown origin).

You can read more about it here.

Posted by delmer at 11:45 AM | Comments (1)

April 6, 2006

Sick Lessons

Though I hate to admit it, I take a little bit of comfort from Big D being sick since Saturday. He and I seem to have the same thing, though he's been officially diagnosed with pneumonia, and I've simply opted to take antibiotics.

Why am I comforted? Well, you've seen Big D and you've seen me -- based on appearance alone you can see that Big D is obviously tougher than I am. I feel no shame in having this bug put me in the recliner for three days ... hopefully, not four.

I've learned a lot in the three days since I've been sick.

Truck Driving schools seem to be on the way out. I don't know that I've seen any commercials for them.

Bob is back. I thought the Enzyte guys had been put out of business but it looks like they've simply been fined and had their hands slapped ... slapped with a big, throbbing ... well, slapped. I can't believe guys buy this product. I'm no doctor, but I'm willing to bet that the only way a pill is going to make a penis change size is if you start jamming them in through the front end. And then it is going to be mostly girth that changes. And, I think this might complicate ejaculation. Again, I'm no doctor.

Also, I've seen Ron Jeremy and I've seen the chicks he can get; Tammy Faye notwithstanding. I've seen Bob and Mrs. Bob. Ron Jeremy is not a handsome man by traditional standards -- still he got to play snuggle bunnies with Allysin Chaynes in Ally McFeal.

Bob would not be a bad looking guy if someone would bitch slap that stupid grin off his face.

So, we've got Ron: not terribly handsome; hot chicks.
Bob: sort of normal looking; frumpy wife.

What could possibly set them apart?

A couple of paragraphs ago I wrote: I can't believe guys buy this product. I'm no doctor, but I'm willing to bet that the only way a pill is going to make a penis change size is if you start jamming them in through the front end. I've rethought that: if Allysin Chaynes were rubbing a pill on my manliness I believe there would be some short-term size change. I doubt the pill would have to be Enzyte.

Another thing I've learned is that if I need to file a Social Security Disability claim I can turn to Binder & Binder. Binder is pronounced as if you were saying, "I'd like to bend her over the porch rail" and I can't believe the legal team goes with that pronunciation -- they should have taken a cue from Ohio Rep. John Boehner and done some pronunciation magic with the name (Boehner goes with Byner over the more obvious and yet schoolyard-ass-kicking-inducing Boner.)

Binder and Binder, I'm certain, are very capable and look like nice guys. I question their use if head gear on their commercials.

If I get hurt in an auto accident I can go to Scott Schiff. Scott comes across like a guy I could trust. He snaps his fingers at the end of his commercial. He looks like a guy you'd want to have a beer with at the local pub.

Kevin Kurgis is also there for me if I'm injured. He looks angry all the time - - even in his commercials. The first time I saw one of his commercials I couldn't help but think, Why would I hire a guy that looks like that in his ads? And then I thought, If he'll do that in his ads ... there would probably be no holding him back in court.

I don't know that I'd want to have a beer with Kevin.

You should really check out the Ron Jeremy IMDB entry. Take a look at the movies he's been in.

Posted by delmer at 11:49 AM | Comments (0)

April 5, 2006

Not that you would ever know

Not that you would ever know by looking, but I've spent several hours tweaking What's a Delmer Look Like today.

First, I fixed the ugliness that adding a rounded box creates when this site is viewed in Internet Explorer. In my fevered state I forgot to fix this yesterday.

And then I tweaked the Books section. The old books section went to a permalink for an entry I kept updating. I wanted this to be its own template, my thought being that it would be easier to update as time wore on.

It doesn't look exactly like I want it to look, but I think it will do. I'm not certain it will be easier to update. It may have been a waste of time, but I feel good knowing that I'm doing what I can to keep my part of the Internet tidy.

I pretty sure that people don't check in here looking for things to read, so, so so ...

I remember being younger, in college, and playing softball with a group. (I think I've told this story before ... bear with me, or don't). I started feeling puny and sat down for a minute. Then I played a bit more. I sat some more. I finally went home.

I took my temperature and found I was running a temperature of 103. I was sure that was wrong, but went to the health center anyway. The doc there took my temperature and confirmed my earlier findings.

Another time, again while in college, I went to the doc feeling a little weak. He looked me over and said, "I can't believe you're walking around with your throat looking like that." His tone didn't suggest I was a fool for being out inasmuch as I might infect others, but his surprise that I was still able to be up and around with my throat looking like it did.

Here I sit ... running 100 degrees ... and feeling like shit.

At least I look like crap too.

After the high-temp-but-looking-and-feeling-OK years I had a period of high-temp-looking-good-and-feeling-bad years. The wife at the time had trouble showing sympathy for that kind of illness. It would seem, now, that I've entered the low-temp-look-and-feel-like-crap portion of my life.

Yea, yea, yea. Poor me.

Posted by delmer at 2:18 PM | Comments (0)

April 4, 2006

Clothing Quandary

At some point in the recent past Kazaa complained that jeans sizes have changed over the years in an effort to make heavier people feel better as they fit into clothing. (Kazaa had noticed that her new jeans were more loose than her old same-style same-size jeans.) I wasn't sure if that was a general clothing thing, a woman thing or maybe just an Aussie thing (The first really big can of beer I remember seeing was one of those Foster's oil can jobs. Maybe everything's getting bigger down there. Have you seen their spiders?)

As it happens, it would appear to be a woman thing.

Why is this important? Well, it isn't. But, I can now fit into jeans the same size as I wore in high school ... back in 1978.

Man. That just sounds soooo girly. Have I mentioned that I'm still sick and my fever is rising?

And, I don't know if the Civil War reference applies to jeans. I'm certain my jeans and dress pants were never the same size; or, maybe, I just never had the desire to pour myself into suit pants.

Posted by delmer at 2:30 PM | Comments (2)

April 3, 2006

I'm a golfing MoFo

I am sick. I thought I was suffering the ill effects of staying up too late on Saturday night. All day Monday I thought this. Tuesday morning, when I got out of bed, I felt better ... and then I started moving.

So, this is my e-mail to Joe.

Some editing appears in brackets. You'll understand why when you see it.

Joe,

I golfed this past Saturday and actually shot par. Maybe one or two under for the front nine. On a real course. One of my drives was 275 yards and straight. Most of my drives were very good and long. Toward 16 and 18 I sort of dug the driver into the ground and had shitty shots. But I was beat by that point ... we'd been up until 4:30 a.m. playing cards and having beer Sunday night.

I should probably mention I was part of a scramble.

BUT ... I had a really good game and we used a fair number of my shots. I made some long putts that almost dropped and when they didn't they were about even with the cup -- that is, they didn't blow by the hole.

One drive, the one we know was 275, there was a group of slow moving gals in front of us. They seemed far enough away. When I hit the ball fear sort of swept through all of us. It came up just a little short of them.

I was using some sort of big black driver Darrell had. Adams something ... maybe 460 grams with some sort of offset; I recall it had Tungsten weighting which provided a low, deep center of gravity, better launch angle and higher MOI. When he suggested I use it I explained I couldn't hit drivers very well ... and then I cranked it. Nobody was more surprised than I.

Some of the others guys had good shots too, but screw them. This is about me me me.

I shot across water like it wasn't even there, using my freebie irons. I never went into the sand.

One of my putts was so long and so almost in that, I swear, I started getting a [Insert reference to something a man gets in an excited state that you really wouldn't want your mom to read about in your blog] the closer it got to the cup. I'm not kidding. I'm getting [same reference less the "-on"] now just typing about it (I am kidding about the current [ditto]).

And so ends the golf part of that e-mail ...

Oh, the bit about center of gravity and MOI I got from the Adams Golf site. I don't really know what MOI is. It took me a second to figure out that CG was center of gravity.

Posted by delmer at 1:27 PM | Comments (3)

April 2, 2006

What's a Delmer sound like

It isn't uncommon for people to mishear my name when I'm introduced to them. I remember, in my mid-20's being introduced to an older female coworker and having her ask, "I'm sorry ... what was your name again."

"What do you think she said," I asked making a reference to the other female coworker who made the introduction.

"It sounded like she said, Delmer?," came the reply with a bit of unbelievability tucked in with it.

"She did."

For whatever reason when people mishear Delmer they often turn it into Bill, which I really don't understand. If I run through a string of DelmerDelmerDelmerDelmerDelmerDelmer as fast as I can it never sounds like BillBillBillBill to me. I don't even hear one Bill in there ...

Posted by delmer at 2:23 PM | Comments (3)

April 1, 2006

My watch makes a fool of me

I have a Timex Data Link watch. It's one of the older ones -- the better looking model if I do say so myself (not this model) -- that I can hold up to my computer monitor to download data into. Last week I had the battery changed.

I drove to Cincinnati this morning to meet with some high school buddies. Sunday we are going to do some golfing.

At one point in the evening I was feeling dead. I checked my watch and saw that it was not yet 11:30 p.m. Far too early to feel as sleepy as I was feeling.

We continued playing cards.

A minute or two passed and Dave, a.k.a. as Ming as in Ming the Merciless due to his history of ruthless card play, spoke up and said, "Boys. It's almost 4:30, I've got to go to church in a couple of hours. I need to get to bed."

What!? I looked at my watch. It was, roughly, 11:30 by my timepiece. Not 4:30 a.m. Sunday morning.

And then I thought back to something that had transpired earlier. I'd looked at the face of my watch, noticed it was blank (the battery wasn't making good contact or something) and gave it a thumping until it displayed the time. The date came up correctly and I assumed the time had as well. It obviously hadn't. Which, in retrospect, is typical of this watch should the battery ever get flaky. (Normally it's a kick-ass watch ... I'm not complaining about it.)

Posted by delmer at 9:02 PM | Comments (2)