So I signed up for POF - Plenty Of Fish.

I went through hundreds of pics of ladies in this area and found maybe a dozen that stood out to me.  The amazing thing was the pics themselves.  People posting pics of their dogs (instead of themselves, not with their dog), people posting pics of entire groups of people (so who is the person that wants to date?), pics with  2 or 3 people in it (which one is the candidate?), pics with the lady hugging or touching a guy (wth, why do I want to date a person that has another guy in the pic?) and then there were pics of ladies that frank? Looked like men.  

Well, anyway.  I'll try that one for a month and if nothing comes of it, I'll try Match.com and I just remembered about Christianmingle.  They're all 30 something per month for one month and price goes down for more than one month.  

The dude here had advice for me: just go to bars and meet up with women and have one night stands, you'll find someone eventually. Rofl.  Okaaaaaay. I thought that funny.  I'm not a night club person, never have been never will be.  Picking up women at bars just not very tasteful in my mind and I am not into one night stands.  But I didn't say all of that to him, I just smiled.  

Oh, and I forgot the large number of pics with women who were actually frowning! WTH.  That'll really get the men attracted to you, have a nice, big scowl on your face. If life is THAT bad, you can be rest assured I want absolutely nothing to do with you, I just got DONE with a person like that!  NO THANKS!  I don't know what these people are thinking putting up pics like that.  Just unhappy? Hopeless that they will ever find someone?  I don't get it.  

Well it's Sunday, it's raining and I have to get ready to drive the 40 miles to church.  I haven't even attempted to start looking for a church over here and I am not convinced yet that I really should.  I need to go over to that city anyway and get into Sam's club and buy some more dog food. This animal is going through a lot of food!  I new he would, but not this much.  He's still growing is the deal, puppy - though you wouldn't look at a dog this big and your first thought being "puppy". lol.  She still hasn't revoked my Sam's club membership, though I expect she will - Val that is.  If she does I will just get my own membership.  The dog food I am buying is apparently only available at Sam's club in this area.  At least, my extensive searching has found no other stores that sell it.  And buying dog food online is not a good idea, they charge more for it and shipping.  

Well I best get to getting ready or I am not going to make it on time.

The weekend is here.  It is a very nice day outside, I'm amazed how nice the weather is
considering it's well into December.  Last year at this time, it was freeeeezing cold here
and not too much fun at work.

Speaking of work, the other driver and I were informed by our manager that the pay
raise is up in the air between the new general manger and my company's headquarters.
But I know this isn't true.  It is completely up to the discretion of the GM as to who gets
paid what according to cap limits on the particular position as set forth by corporate.
And I also know there are no cap limits for a truck driver.  I would have been making
around $24 per hour right now with the raise I would have gotten - which would have
been substantially more than the one I got over here this year, at least double.

The new driver has finally gotten enough people pissed off that he is likely going to be
let go after the New Year.  I don't disagree with that assessment. Number 1, it is impossible
to get another driver before then - even temp drivers have to go through our company's
extensive screening process and number 2, well, just a little heartless to do that at Christmastime.

Work has been irritating me though.  I clean up the pipe yard, others come in and trash it. This has been going on for a while to the point I took some pics of the alleged yard man who unloaded a pipe truck and just dumped the pipe where it doesn't belong, on top of other pipe that is different diameter or even totally different type of pipe - and left it that way.  In other words, someone HAS to come behind him and put the pipe away where it belongs, instead of him just putting it where it belongs as he is unloading the truck.  I have unloaded thousands of trucks, I know it can be done! lol.  I sent the pics to my manager, but I know it's a losing battle. He texted back thanks for showing me this, but nothing was done about it.  The manager has been working there since he was 17 - he's in his 30's now.  The yard man has been there for somewhere around 20 years.  My manager has too much emotional content involved with that yard man - the driver who wrecked the truck and did $12,000 worth of damage to the truck and over 100k of damage (totaled vehicles) to vehicles he smashed.

As per the raise and/or promotion, I just want an answer. It's been what, 2 months? Ridiculous.

I've done no Christmas shopping.  I am just buying for mom, my son and the people I am living with. I mean, I blocked my middle brother on FB.  He has no desire to have a relationship with me, unfriended me a couple of years ago and has never wanted to "re-friend", I am fed up with it. I would rather not see his posts on my mom's wall.  My oldest brother doesn't do Facebook or any other social media - I actually don't blame him - he has no desire to be with family but once per year.  Yup, once per year. He does see mom when she's up at her property though. He has a cabin down the dirt road about - 7 miles? away.  It is a uniquely strange situation to have a family that doesn't want to see each other.  I have given up on it.  And I don't feel compelled to buy Christmas presents for people that want nothing to do  with me.

So, when I take my week off for Christmas? What?  lol.  I have no plans, whatsoever. I am feeling highly umotivated. Last year I spent it with Val and 6 of her kids.  Well actually, all but 1 showed up during that day.  Now I have no-one to share it with but these folks.  As for finding a lady friend, that is likely not going to happen that fast. In fact, I am still attempting to decide which online dating service I want to try.  They all cost money and I have no idea which of them might have better results than others.  They are likely all the same, with a lot of desperate people wanting instant families and instant fathers to take care of their children and - pay for them.  They may not admit that, but it becomes quickly understood that is really all they want once you realize that they don't CARE if there is a magnetic attraction or even love, just please pay for my kids, thanks.

I had been living a life on hold because of the divorce, but the divorce is over, the damage is not undone.  I have much more to deal with internally than I initially thought.  It was so easy for her to just tune me out of her life like flipping a light switch. It is  perplexing thought that likely will stay with me the rest of my life.  Yet, that is still not going to stop me from searching.  I have a large number of people responding to my POF ad (plenty of fish) but you have to pay to see the messges.

That's it. I think I will go outside and replace the headlight bulb on my car and then go out somewhere and just relax at a restaurant or something.

It was the most involved, intricate scam I have ever been on the receiving end of.
That - being - this "lady" that we were going to go on a date on Sunday. These scammers
are using tactics that go beyond the stupid stuff that is totally obvious now.  Apparently
they have figured out we are not all dumb.  It is hard to imagine texting with a person
every day for a week or however long for extended periods to find out that they aren't
who they say they are.  The alarm bells started ringing when I asked if I could call her
and she said - she had dropped her phone in water. The phone could text, but couldn't make
calls.

Anything can happen when water enters a phone, but I had a feeling about it.  I didn't ignore
it, either.  There were small clues all along - but what happened today finally busted it open.
She said all the nice, kind words and said sadly, I cannot pay my internet bill.  I knew what was
coming before "she" (at this point, I am guessing likely a guy). "She" added to the list.  I can't
pay my phone bill.  Ohhh? How much is it going to cost you?  Well I need your help.  I am
going to lose my access to the phone if you can't help.  And on and on.

It was the Western Union game - Western Union is the bank of thieves, they can get their money
and get away with it.  Unless I personally know someone, I won't deal with Western Union.  I
tested it with "her".  When I said I would send the money to her name in her town, she replied
back that she didn't have ID and would have me send it to a "trusted friend".  Ooookay. Kept
playing.  Name of a person in San Antonio - same state but certainly not down the street and around
the corner.  I then decided to check "her" phone number.  Prefix in Minnesota.  Then checked the phone number itself.  A complaint registered on a website but no comment to say what it was.

So, she has a broken phone that won't make phone calls. A prefix from Minnesota, a friend in San Antonio to collect her money.  So what, her friend is going to drive hundreds of miles to give it to her? I then offered to bring it to her.  "She"  is a 2 hour drive away.  I don't much care about distance if it's the right person - as long as it doesn't have to be an airplane flight away, I have determined. She couldn't have me coming to see her, she allegedly can't make calls and she doesn't "like" using another person's phone to talk (I said fine, just use someone else's phone to talk to me).  I then pretended that my Western Union account wasn't working and I would have to go to Walmart and do a money gram. And since you don't have ID, I will just the pasword option - I did this with a person I know very well in Mexico not 2 months ago.  Instead of showing ID, you give them the exact passwords that the sender submits and that's it.

She didn't reply for a while and then said I didn't love her and yada yada. I had her number and I finally called her out on it in no uncertain terms and not actually too nice about it, either, considering she was willing to toy with my emotions to try to bilk money out of me.  She completely disappeared.

I actually busted out laughing while driving the semi up I-49 today when I realized what was going on.  I haven't met this person IN person yet, there were no strings attached to my heart.

Ohhh, dangit. I'm very tired and it's 15 minutes past my bedtime. Take this up this weekend.  

I walked into the courtroom - 15 minutes early allegedly - sat down and 2 minutes later the judge called her up to the bench and proclaimed I must not be there.  Apparently they had had this discussion and were waiting  Naomi had informed me that it was at 11:15, but obviously it was supposed to start at 11.  She - Val -- had an extremely fake smile plastered on her face.  I said nothing to her.  I didn't go there to get into it with her, I went to make sure that no shenanigans were going to be pulled. Not that I expected it, but you never know.  The judge recited legaleze, we agreed, he declared the marriage terminated and that was that.

I am now, officially, a divorced man, yet again. Easy divroce, no conflict, no disagreements on property, no children to deal with.  I was only gone an hour and got divorced, went to the gas station, went to the bank, another store, KFC for lunch and home.

When I walked out of the courtroom, she called my name - I was and am in no mood to talk to her - handed me an envelope with the 4 wheeler title - she has the other one for it's still over there and I haven't made up my mind about it - and then asked if I had made up my mind - which I have not.  When do you expect to? Soon. Okay, thank you and that was it.  And I assume that to BE it for the rest of our lives.  I really wanted to visit Duke's grave one last time before all of this was over with, but, too late.

I have no feelings of "freedom" like I did the first marriage.  A bit sad, actually.  Giving up as much as I did and doing what I did to marry her wasn't exactly a small thing for me.  She dismissed it - asking me what I gave up, as if nothing.

Whatever the case and not delving into that again, I have numerous decisions to make.  Stay, go.  Find a new job.  Start dating again or not.  Live here where I'm at if I do decide to stay or get my own place and rent out rooms.

I'm going to wait on any job decisions until after the New Year.  I likely going to start looking around for someone to start a relationship with.  Not positive on that one, just thinking about it.  Staying here is cool as long as they are cool with me being here, actually.  I'm just not sure I will want to stay in this region with what has happened.  I don't know how my thinking is going to be whenever I go into Longview now that we are officially divorced and thinking about all the memories - mostly bad unfortunately - and what occurred.

So, nothing has to be decided today.  They are home today as well.  Dude was told to stay home today for lack of work, she came home after finding out she has laringitis.  Don't actually remmeber how to spell that word, but if I recall correctly, it is highly contagious.  I don't realy need to be getting sick again now that I am finally just about done with the last garbage.

3 hours from now, I presume I will be a twice divorced man.
The daughter filed for a court hearing on Monday and got the
hearing scheduled for today.  How do you get a court date that fast?
And how do you get away with giving such short notice?  I was informed
that I didn't have to show up.  Lol, nice try.  Perhaps the judge will just
sign off on the paperwork - or perhaps not.  It's the tangent and possibility
of perhaps not that makes me show up to court, which is scheduled at 11:15 am.
It is also about a mile and a half away from where I live.  I took the day off
work to go deal with this, yes.  I want to hear the judge say whatever he/she
has to say about it.  If nothing, great, but I am not going to just leave it to
chance.  Not to mention she will have to be there and will be the first time
seeing her since she filed.  Yes, she ended this relationship over the internet
and I want to be there, in person, for her to have to see me even if the last
time.  Ending a marriage over the relationship?  That's just totally lame.

Other than that, everything else going as it has been. Still no word on raise or
promotion and keep forgetting to ask when I see the manager, but rest assured
I will be asking this week.  New driver still not doing very well - he knows how
to drive but he doesn't want to do anything else.  He wants us to help him pull
orders and load the truck. Well, loading trucks?  You better have that one down
yourself, bud, this isn't elemenatary school and we aren't your supervisors.  I
don't mind helping him learn, but he continues to talk as if he has never heard
any of it before, even though we have repeatedly tried to show him how to do
things.  After a while, it just plain gets old.

Addler - new pup - is doing good but he is showing some signs of aggression.
Mostly directed at one particular dog that they have here.  That dog pushes it, though,
quite a lot, nipping at him and growling.  Addler responds in kind - putting his huge
mouth around the dog's neck but not biting and growling back.  He then smacks the
dog with his giant paw and basically toys with it. I'm not a real fan of that kind of
behavior.  I think getting him neutered will help take care of this kind of stuff - I
just am going to wait until next month or even the one after to do it.  It's $300 for
the procedure.

Well the 3 hours has turned into 40 minutes.  I am only 5 minutes from the courthouse.
Nope, no parking issues, been by there dozens of times, there is ample public parking
across the street.  It's just go through the metal detector, go to 2cd story, go in the court
room, wait for judge, listen to judge, get this over with.

So, trying to find airfare home for or near Christmas - daunting.  I'm not going to spend a fortune.  If that's the case, I'll wait til' after Christmas and visit home when prices come down.  I was reading about potential cyber deals for tomorrow - Cyber Monday - if you are looking for anything cheaper than normal, please search the internet tomorrow.  You can find amazing deals.  Cheaper prices, free shipping, one day only stuff.  An article I read said that airlines don't typically advertise those kinds of fares in advance, you have to go to their sites and check on that day or sign up for their newsletter.

I don't have to be there on Christmas day to be happy.  I can be here on Christmas day and think nothing of not being home with family. The reason is simple: my family is stupid dysfunctional. The only one that really wants to see me is mom and she is quite content to see me whenever I can come.  My son is still in Portland and has not stated a return date. He is apparently liking it there very much.  Maybe he will just stay there indefinitely, who knows.  He's on an adventure in life and though he isn't really learning anything for any kind of career - I did the same thing at his age and I have absolutely no regrets.  I take that back. He has done he gen-ed courses and was studying to learn Japanese. I don't know if he's going to finish.

I did recently have an internet college student encourage me to take some online classes.  I have only considered it thus far.  If I can find classes that don't cost a fortune, yes.  But if they want 30 40 50k, they can stuff it.  How is online worth the same or even more than going to a brick and mortar building and having access to teachers in person? They will give you all kinds of answers - I have been through this process of trying to find an online college - but their answers are lame.  No buildings to pay for, upkeep, taxes, electricity, water, etc.  Well they have a home building, I guess, where their computers are located, but nothing near as grandiose as a college.  I jsut refuse to pay premium rates and get into loans for online courses.

The other option is community colleges.  Allegedly they are pretty cheap in this area - I can attest that in the Phoenix area, they are not. But then again, Phoenix and surrounding cities are college towns.  ASU is the biggest but there are a LOT more colleges there.

That is a tangent I didn't even think of going into here.  My head is still wrapped around going over to her place today.  I'm glad I haven't been over there in months now, It would have been much harder to unravel my mind and heart from all of that if  for whatever reason I had to go over there.  I don't - actually - miss her that much.  I'm not sorry to say that, not after all I've been through.  But she has a beautiful, gorgeous property.  Not anything even remotely close to being a good reason to stay in a very toxic and bad relationship, but still.  That's a property I could never afford - though property out in the wild blue yonder in the middle of nothing ness is definitely affordable.  Don't underestimate the profession I am in.  Drivers can live literally anywhere if they are OTR and can take the truck home with them.  Not interest in OTR, but could do regional.  I'm definitely not married to my current company, not at the pay scale I am at.

This has been a strange day.  It has also been raining, non-stop, all day long. I didn't care about that over there, though.  I didn't make my co-worker get out of his vehicle over there.  He wasn't dressed for the occasion, lol. He had his two young kids with him.  He has custody of them. The mom is a lunatic.  I mean, to the point of having to be hauled off to jail last weekend because she showed up to see the kids and went off on Terrance's mom.  The kid's shoes out in front of her house. I had never seen that before and it dawned on me that all of those shoes are shoes that I bought for those kids. They weren't near my stuff that was left out there.  I am perplexed by that.  Did they somehow think I wanted their shoes back?

I don't know, but we are now entering the final stage of the divorce.  It will be scheduled for a short hearing before the judge. But it's not really a hearing. The judge looks over the paperwork and - signs off on it.  The daughter eluded to me not having to show up.  Umm, no, I'll be there, thanks.  A judge has no restraints by a piece of paper worked up by consenting adults.  He/she may look at the thing and have questions.  Or, she/val could bring up something to change in the paperwork and if I"m not there? Default judgement.  I don't leave things like that up to chance.  I politely told the daughter - Naomi - that I will be there, please let me know when it is, thanks.  I don't really ever want to see Val again after the things that she has done, but I will endure it for a short period of time to ensure that nothing happens that I can't object to.

________________________________________

Sunday evening now. Started this post yesterday.  I have all kinds of thoughts running through my mind.

I spent the day cleaning - well not all day, but a lot of it.  My room, laundry, their kitchen. They had people over last night and there was a great deal of aftermath. I don't complain about it, but I wanted to cook this morning so I cleaned the entire mess up while cooking  - after cleaning off a space - and got that all done. I'm old enough to be dads to most everyone that shows up here. Which doesn't bother me, I'm just saying, it is a generational gap and though I can relate with much of it - I cannot relate with all of it. Anime for one thing.  This is Japanese version of adult cartoons.

Anyway, I still have this vision of her place when I came down the driveway and saw it for the first time in quite a while. And yes, it is DOWN a driveway.  You come up a long driveway, through a horse ranch and then over the top and back down again.  It is a very secluded place.  Anyway, those 2 4 wheelers were sitting in the grassy area in the driveway circle, faced directly at - me I guess - as I drove in. If I weren't at the mercy of the dude coming behind me to pull them out of there, I would have taken the time to visit with the cows and then go down and spend a few final moments at Duke's grave.  

There are other ways in there, that place is so far from her house and out of sight - completely out of sight that I could visit it coming from the undeveloped land beside it.  Why would you want to do that?  If you aren't a dog lover and haven't had a dog has been in your family for an extended period of time, you won't understand it. If you have, you might or might not. Duke was such a gentle spirit. I've had a lot of dogs and very good ones, but Duke was very special to me.  And others as well.  Val's babysitter that was watching the kids during the summer has numerous photos of him posted on her Facebook wall.  She explained to me that he kept her company during lonely nights - kids off to bed, Val in her room, I'm thrown out, she's a 20 something downstairs, alone, dog keeping her company.  I suspect she loved Duke as much as I did from her description of it and after seeing pics of her and him after he passed. I had no idea.

Oops, past my  bedtime. I was just getting started, actualy.  Really, I was.  Oh well.