But one of those days includes lunch with Wendy over in Granville. Yay!! And one of those days is that Hospice training at the Agency. (Good — but I wouldn’t go so far as to say, “yay”.)

The rest of it — mostly new shifts. Wow. And none of them more than a 20-minute drive from here.

And only one of those days is in the morning (a new double on Tuesday).

I’m still trying to wrap my mind around how much everything changed in my life overnight. And I really, really, really needed it to change, gang. My depression was off the charts.

And me and depression — not a good combination. It honestly feels like I woke up this past Tuesday, and God said: “Here, have a new life.”

And part of the changes around here – I’m trying to make myself sleep in until 5 AM. No more of this getting up at 3 o’clock anymore and scrolling around on my phone. And now that I’ll be working some evenings again, I’m making myself stay up later at night again, just generally.

Just those 2 simple changes — feeling like I have more time, just for myself — stress level went way down.

Okay!

Yesterday I had a nice phone chat with Wayne, because when the insurance guy came for the bi-annual meeting, the guy felt that I really, really didn’t need the life insurance policy.

Have you ever heard of an insurance guy not wanting to sell you life insurance?!

It was actually for a good reason (I have to say that I really love my insurance guys). He felt that since I was paying only for a cremation, and since I have more than enough in my savings to pay for a cremation out-of-pocket, the money I spend every month on life insurance would be better spent beefing up my Long Term Care options.

Wow. What a great idea. Since I work in the Long Term Care field, I see what people go through first hand, and I would not want to be without Long Term Care options.

Since Wayne is the one who will handle all my end-of-life stuff, I just wanted to make sure he was comfortable with me giving up the life insurance — he was. (And he even said that if for some reason I had no money at all left when I died, he’d just pay for it himself. Wow. So nice.) (I know. You have to sort of wonder why we’ve been divorced now for 19 years…)

Anyway!!

After the cheerful topic of cremations and money, we had a really nice chat!

And since it was my day off — I did yoga. Did some prep cooking for the next few days. Started reading the new book for James Tabor’s Research Group– it is very interesting. It makes a very good case that the Gospel of John is actually a synoptic gospel:

(I’m still reading John Cooper Clarke’s autobiography, I Wanna Be Yours, and still loving it!)

And I also started re-listening to a lecture series I took from The Great Courses about 12 years ago — taught by Bart Ehrman: The Greatest Controversies of Early Christian History.

You can browse through the course here. (It costs $25 and you can listen to it on a phone app.) It is really fascinating. Some of this stuff, I’d actually forgotten. (But all of it was part of why I gave up pursuing my ministry after I graduated from Ohio Christian University, wanting to study the Historical Jesus, instead.)

And then, last night, I started watching a really great movie on Metrograph — part of their Pride Month collection — Keep the Lights On, directed by Ira Sachs, 2012. Wow, is it good.

Great acting. Deep story — whether or not you’re gay, if you’ve ever been in love with an addict, you will relate to the authentic emotions in this film. And of course it takes place in NYC, in 1998-2008, so I related even more. But it is not over the top in any way. Just very well done:

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Okay, while checking in with all my various new and out-of-print books available online, I discovered this today: you can buy a used copy of my short-story collection from 2004, Lust: Bisexual Erotica, for a mere $110.13 plus shipping.

I had to look twice at that price.

So I wanted to remind you that you can read Lust online for free at the Internet Archive! It is like an online library.

Just follow the above link. I would recommend clicking the icon for “full screen” and also the icon to read it on a single page, rather than a double page, and voila! The book is right there. Free. (Adults only, though, please.)

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Okay.

Some “here’s this’s” for this sunny Friday!

I thought this was so cute!

From Steve Vai yesterday:

And I also had a really cool little private text exchange with Billy Sheehan on Instagram yesterday, too. About Yngwie Malmsteen. But I won’t repost it here.

However, let’s listen to this! I first became aware of both Billy Sheehan (bass) and Steve Vai (guitar), when they began playing with David Lee Roth after he left Van Halen. I saw this particular tour in NYC, at Madison Square Garden. But this is from Detroit — but in the days before cell phones, when you weren’t allowed to bring cameras into the arena!! (Can you imagine???)

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And here’s this. Just because I like the photo. And Dwight’s music in the 80s was just incredible:

And here’s this, again!! Talk about hillbilly twang!! Yay!!

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Okay!!

Nick Cave was honored with another (!!) Lifetime Achievement Award in the Arts, somewhere between the shows in Germany and Denmark!!

And while the show in Denmark looks like it was really great, there was sort of a lack of photos. (Almost makes you think you’re still not allowed to bring cameras to arenas in Denmark!!) Well, there were a few videos. But still. Not a whole lot. At least, not yet.

Here’s the official set list, although I saw another handwritten list that included a REALLY long encore.

Even though I find Facebook really boring now, I do follow Nick Cave fan pages there! This was posted early this morning:

And this was on Instagram:

Tomorrow, the Bad Seeds play Prague(!!) and you can buy tickets here.

The show in Austria, on Sunday, is sold out.

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And I guess that is it for today!!

Gonna go water my flowers. Then do yoga. take a shower, wash my hair… have lunch… and then leave for my evening shift with the retired Chaplain who is finally home from Florida!!

Enjoy your Friday, wherever you are in the world.

Thanks for visiting.

I love you guys. See ya!

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Let’s close with this!

Nick Cave & the Bad Seeds, live in Denmark, 6 years ago!!

The absolute gem, “Into My Arms”. Enjoy, gang.