Post Race!

[dday9]

Did it raise your interest

[wes4dbt]

Another 3 hour phone call this evening. All very calm, normal, comfortable. I even got a "well, maybe" about the major point of contention. That's as close to an admission as I've heard so far. I'll wait to press for that apology though.

A lot of "real" discussion of old people's health issues in general. We're both now coming around to the idea that living solo at 70+ isn't going to be a safe thing for anybody. She even raised the dreaded "M word" in a joking way, something she'd recently backed away from as "unnecessary in today's world anyway."

A discussion of movies and TV produced an opening and I pressed for a touchy discussion. All we found was another area of high compatibility. And no, not that so get your minds out of the gutter!

So you ok with moving into her $1.5million home or do you want to move her to your $2million home. lol

Sounds like your both into long conversations.

[dilettante]

So you ok with moving into her $1.5million home or do you want to move her to your $2million home. lol

Sounds like your both into long conversations.

Pretty funny. No, you'd cry if you saw this hovel. She already wants out of her place, and I have no attachment to mine.

I bought a handset that plugs into the cell phone, looks very close to a classic Western Electric product from the 70s-80s. Good sound and more comfortable to use.

Sure there are lulls, we've just learned to accept them as in any conversation.

[Shaggy Hiker]

What's the geographical separation look like?

I've been chasing a gal who lives 5000 miles away (which is why I'm only chasing). Neither one of us are attached to where currently live. In fact, we know the negatives of those locations quite well. However, figuring out an ideal location isn't so simple, either.

As for the "M-word", yeah, it's not so mandatory these days, but when you get older, it may become increasingly convenient. As medical issues become a larger part of your world, having a legal relationship can become mighty useful. I'm pretty sure my father got married in 2019 largely because the partnership needed a legal basis such that medical issues could be simpler to deal with.

You may not be planning to start a family, but marriage at your age is more like a much older form of marriage: A legal partnership.

[dilettante]

What's the geographical separation look like?

I've been chasing a gal who lives 5000 miles away (which is why I'm only chasing). Neither one of us are attached to where currently live. In fact, we know the negatives of those locations quite well. However, figuring out an ideal location isn't so simple, either.

As for the "M-word", yeah, it's not so mandatory these days, but when you get older, it may become increasingly convenient. As medical issues become a larger part of your world, having a legal relationship can become mighty useful. I'm pretty sure my father got married in 2019 largely because the partnership needed a legal basis such that medical issues could be simpler to deal with.

You may not be planning to start a family, but marriage at your age is more like a much older form of marriage: A legal partnership.

In our case it's a mere 800 miles. Just enough to be too inconvenient to drive. Split the difference and both drive to somewhere in the middle sounds possible, but I wouldn't ask that. I'm used to 600 mile driving but many people aren't, and her issues suggest that might be a scary proposition for her. So flying is probably a given, and the hassle of car rental these days.

I had raised the same point earlier about the legal partnership aspects. That's when she said she had cooled on the idea, but it get the impression she may have thought it over since then and is coming over to the idea that it simplifies a lot of things for a pair of codgers. The alternative is a bunch of other legal agreements and documents, and there can still be issues when emergencies arise, etc.

So maybe table it as a goal and plan something less entangled to start out? We'll talk about it.

[Shaggy Hiker]

I read that as, "a pair of coders", which made me wonder how you managed that.

[dilettante]

I read that as, "a pair of coders", which made me wonder how you managed that.

By texts today I asked for houseplant advice. She seem to perk up at that and made suggestions.

5 hours of calls today, 3 before she went out with friends, a text in the middle from the noisy s**t kicker bar, then 2 more hours at 11:30 when she got home.

I'm supposed to call when I wake up to say "Good morning."

We are trying to make it as normal as we can.

[wes4dbt]

By texts today I asked for houseplant advice. She seem to perk up at that and made suggestions.

5 hours of calls today, 3 before she went out with friends, a text in the middle from the noisy s**t kicker bar, then 2 more hours at 11:30 when she got home.

I'm supposed to call when I wake up to say "Good morning."

We are trying to make it as normal as we can.

Is that normal? I don't think I've ever talked to anyone that much. And I like to talk. lol

[dilettante]

Is that normal? I don't think I've ever talked to anyone that much. And I like to talk. lol

Point taken.

Maybe it is better described as simulating presence. I would get frustrated with that much contact face-to-face pretty quickly.

[Shaggy Hiker]

That sounds pretty great, really. Sure, that's a lot of phone time, but it means you aren't boring. At the start of a relationship, there's a whole lot of "getting to know each other", and that amount of time certainly suggests that she's liking what she's hearing. You may be surprised at how this has turned out, but you should be pretty happy about it.

[dilettante]

That sounds pretty great, really. Sure, that's a lot of phone time, but it means you aren't boring. At the start of a relationship, there's a whole lot of "getting to know each other", and that amount of time certainly suggests that she's liking what she's hearing. You may be surprised at how this has turned out, but you should be pretty happy about it.

Thanks.

It really has turned out to be pretty special. It actually did come out of nowhere, just a chance meting on a social forum site, connecting, and then more developing from that.

She'd been a member there for about a year, but hardly viewing it and rarely posting anything. I'd only been there for 3 months. It isn't the sort of place anyone goes to for "people shopping." Slightly different timing and we'd never have even "met."

It's probably fairly parallel to most meetings of the kind that occur in the face-to-face world.

Aside from figuring out the logistics of moving the relationship forward from here, I feel pretty good about it.

[wes4dbt]

Point taken.

Maybe it is better described as simulating presence. I would get frustrated with that much contact face-to-face pretty quickly.

Don't get me wrong, if your enjoying it then it's all good. It's just not something I'd enjoy.

My daughter likes to talk on the phone. She'll call and we might talk for an hour but by then I'm trying to find a way to end the conversation. Part of the problem might be I just don't have that much that I want to talk about. I do tend keep some large parts of my life private. Also, I lead a pretty boring life. lol

[Shaggy Hiker]

My mother and I would talk a whole lot. She had been working on the research for her PhD in political systems when she got a little TOO into the research. She ended up dropping the dissertation, running for office, and serving multiple terms in office at state and local levels (local in NH, too, which if you know government systems, is a bit weird). My father is more into brief conversations, but my mother wanted to look at any political problem from any angle, and I was a good foil for that. The one annoying part is that she was such a student of politics, down to such mundane things as the science between road repair, that she knew both sides of any position backwards and forwards. It wasn't that she would say, "you're wrong", as that she would say, "the way you should have argued that position was based on this data...." These days, Google isn't quite as well informed.

We'd have longer conversations. I have good conversations with my father, now, but they are much more succinct.

[Shaggy Hiker]

The one other thing I would say is that, Dil, you thought she was out of your league. Perhaps you don't know the league you are in.

[dilettante]

The one other thing I would say is that, Dil, you thought she was out of your league. Perhaps you don't know the league you are in.

I'm a little perplexed by that, but I'll take it as a compliment. LOL

[dilettante]

Er, was that "in league with the Devil?" LOL

[Shaggy Hiker]

I remember you starting out this discussion with some statement (which I'm not going to look up, so if it's wrong it's wrong) about chatting with a gal who was way out of your league.

[Shaggy Hiker]

Got home yesterday after a fairly benign flight. I remember the days when you'd get a meal and a few drinks on a flight. These days, you just get whatever virus is going around at the time. COVID, flu, run-of-the-mill cold, or whatever. I think I came back with kennel cough.

[dilettante]

I remember you starting out this discussion with some statement (which I'm not going to look up, so if it's wrong it's wrong) about chatting with a gal who was way out of your league.

That's true. But suddenly I find that the entire thing may be over anyway.

Disturbing dream about her dead husband left her very unsettled. I offered support, but gave her time to process it. She came back saying that I was right, and she's already had a 3rd cry about it today.

As we know about "the friend zone" once you're there it is almost always permanent.

Even that can't last, because any new woman will not tolerate female friendships that close. Been there, done that. It's a trap. Even if you cut off the close friendship... the new potential relationship may not pan out anyway. Again, been there.

That's pretty much why I'd given up on all of this quite a long time ago. I wasn't even looking casually when this situation came about out of nowhere.

So I'll see.

[Shaggy Hiker]

Does seem to run hot and cold. I see that, too. Hard to figure.

[dilettante]

That's why I asked about a manual.

I decided to take risk by taking a page from her book: passive aggression.

Posted this, not to her, but where she can't miss finding it:

https://www.vbforums.com/showthread....=1#post5631740

Turn on the CC for the lyrics.

[wes4dbt]

Awfully quiet around here. No one complaining, no one laughing, not even a love story.

I guess everyone is just content.

[dilettante]

Or trying to stay out of trouble.

It gets weird. Phone call last night that ended feeling funny. Called back a while later, yep she was bummed. Reassurance, reassurance, decided to confide something. She'd been talking about ukelele lessons (?) a while ago. I'd looked into instruments to accompany uke and found that ocarinas often do. Told her I bought one and was starting to learn to play it. She had no idea what I was talking about, I said "You know: ocarina. Sweet Potato?"

She found that hilarious for some reason. Laughed and laughed almost to the point of tears. I threatened to call her that in front of her friends: "Please pass the peas, Sweet Potato?" LMAO "Don't... you... dare!"

We had a good laugh and both felt better.

It's a lot of work but I try to overcome a little of the distance. I suppose being a bit demented is a useful skill after all.

[wes4dbt]

I suppose being a bit demented is a useful skill after all.

A lot of the time the demented part of a person is the most interesting and fun. As long as it doesn't get too dark.

I've always thought my families sense of humor was a little demented.

[dilettante]

Well she must be warming up again. She's even thinking about sending me another picture to replace the evaporating one from the secure chat app. She's probably concerned that I've substituted another image in my mind for her. LOL

I'm not so paranoid, having posted several of myself all over that social forum site and in my avatar there. So far only one that's pretty old now and been around turns up in a Google of my name, so I see little to get in a twist over.

[Shaggy Hiker]

An evaporating image? Does she fade away slowly, or shrink in from the edges?

[dilettante]

An evaporating image? Does she fade away slowly, or shrink in from the edges?

You can set an expiation and then messages, images, voice clips, video clips all go away after 5 minutes, half an hour, 8 hours, etc.

[Peter Porter]

An evaporating image? Does she fade away slowly, or shrink in from the edges?

You can set an expiation and then messages, images, voice clips, video clips all go away after 5 minutes, half an hour, 8 hours, etc.

And then it evaporates like so, Shaggy:

[Shaggy Hiker]

Fade to white.

[dilettante]

I have a 5 foot cudgel or staff. It's a straight length of young redbud tree trunk that had died and seasoned in-place out back. I sawed off both ends and barked it, and it had a lot of personality. Some deep cracks, an interesting grain of blonde and mahogany. Five feet long and about 1 1/2 inches at the small end, maybe 2 1/2 inches at the wide end after it cured in the shed for a year.

I soaked and rubbed in mineral oil, and it took most of 2 quarts minus some rag waste and a little left over. It "dried" well with no oily feel. Nice heft. I did a wrap of simple twine at the thick end.

I use it for working out. Somewhat like a heavy kendo shinai a little, but more something used for general free-form working out of the arms and shoulders, a ballast for twisting at the waist, hold it for standing forward bends and extensions, as a "lever" for back bends, etc.

Today:

Wasn't paying attention and knocked my noggin. Raised a bit of a forehead bump, and I sent her a picture of that. Sympathy? No, she laughed!

Can this relationship be saved?

[wes4dbt]

Well, now you know how to make her laugh. I hope your body can handle it. lol

[Peter Porter]

Maybe she'll forget about it if it evaporates.

Did you set it's expiration?

[dilettante]

Did you set it's expiration?

Nah, I just sent it normally. Things are going pretty well lately.

[Shaggy Hiker]

I have a 5 foot cudgel or staff.

Actually, it's a buck and a quarter, quarter staff, but don't tell her that.

[Shaggy Hiker]

Wasn't paying attention and knocked my noggin. Raised a bit of a forehead bump, and I sent her a picture of that. Sympathy? No, she laughed!

Can this relationship be saved?

That's the response I would expect. Sounds pretty good, to me.

[dilettante]

Actually, it's a buck and a quarter, quarter staff, but don't tell her that.

I guess it was a daffy thing to do.

[Shaggy Hiker]

Yes, exactly. And good for a laugh.

[Peter Porter]

Wasn't paying attention and knocked my noggin. Raised a bit of a forehead bump, and I sent her a picture of that. Sympathy? No, she laughed!

Can this relationship be saved?

Dil, as long as you don't do her laundry, you're still good.

[dilettante]

There are certainly highs to the journey, but at times it can feel Sisyphean too.

[Shaggy Hiker]

Ohhhhh yeah!