First things first, today is the third anniversary of my relationship with Swan. That’s quite a milestone given my long history of failing at love. My goal is to make this love last a lifetime. Wish me luck!

As far as yesterday went, the most significant event was me getting grumpy. That’s not particularly unusual, but I don’t recall it happening in a place named “It Doesn’t Matter.” It did to me. And yeah, it wasn’t a big deal, but I still found it irksome enough to spoil my visit. Here’s what happened: When I’m at IDM, I always sit on the outdoor patio. There are two tables out there and several chairs that line a countertop facing the road. I prefer the tables, but when I arrived, both were occupied with customers, so I took a seat at the counter and ordered up a beer while I awaited Swan’s arrival. I noted one of the table customers had a couple of the waitresses sitting with him, and he bought them lady drinks and some food. When he finally got up and left, I prepared to claim my table. Except the waitresses continued to sit there chatting away and playing with their phones. I figured maybe the customer was coming back and they were saving his table. Except he didn’t return, and they both acted like I wasn’t even there. I finally got up, went inside the bar, and got another beer. You’d think they’d take the hint, but they didn’t. So, when I finished my beer, I went back inside, paid my tab, and departed. No one inside seemed concerned about the failure of the wait staff outside to perform their duties. The owner wasn’t there, and it seems there is no one around to manage the place since Cliff and Ashley left for greener pastures at Red Bar. Yeah, I could have said something to the table loungers, and in hindsight, perhaps I should have. But as a long-standing regular customer at IDM, I shouldn’t have to. There are lots of other options in Barretto, and with things being so slow these days, I’m sure my business will be appreciated elsewhere.

Okay, rant over. And I acknowledge that if that’s the worst thing that happened to me yesterday, it was still a pretty fine day.

It’s the rainy season, and the threatening skies limited my hike options. So, I played it safe and did the boring Barretto street walk. Got in a little over 6K but didn’t see anything worthy of pausing to take a photo. On the bright side, I only had to pull my umbrella out twice during the journey.

I didn’t let the IDM thing spoil the rest of my evening either. We stopped by Sit-n-Bull for some grub, and I had a tasty shaved ham sandwich. Then we headed next door to Wet Spot for our nightcap and enjoyed ourselves as usual. The big difference between Wet Spot and The Jungle is that manager Brett plays songs we old-timers like, probably because he is one of us.

I didn’t have a thing to complain about for the rest of the evening and went home for a contented night’s sleep.

I’ve been refraining from politics lately because what’s the point when minds aren’t going to change anyway. I do enjoy laughing along sometimes, though:

I don’t mess around with AI much, but the Meta version on Facebook offered to fix up one of my old photos, so I hit the “okay” button.

Like this one, from Facebook memories today:

Continuing on with the June 2020 LTG archives, and I’m Seriously wondering if I might be better off alone. A nice benefit of this journey through the archives is being reminded of the hows and whys that led me to where I am today. Jessa has told me she doesn’t think I’m serious about her, and the best response I had to that was “sorry you feel that way.” Well, I figured it was my fault that things didn’t work out, but she was better off without me. A great woman, but I was unworthy. And here I am today celebrating three years with Swan, so I guess it was just a matter of timing.

Today’s YouTube video is a short one (less than three minutes), and the Filipina vlogger explains why the tide is turning against us old white guys when it comes to relationships. Yep, the local gals prefer men their age and of the same heritage who share a common language and culture. Go figure.

Humor time:

A guy was sitting quietly reading his paper when his wife walked up behind him and whacked him on the head with a rolled-up magazine.

“What the hell was that for?” he asked.

“That was for the piece of paper in your pants pocket with the name Mary Lou written on it,” she replied.

“But you don’t understand,” he pleaded. “Two weeks ago when I went to the races, Mary Lou was the name of one of the horses I bet on.”

“Oh honey, I’m sorry,” she said. “I should have known there was a good explanation.”

Three days later he was watching a ball game on TV when she walked up and hit him in the head again, this time with the iron skillet, which knocked him out cold. When he came to, he asked, “What was that for?” he pleaded.

“Your horse just called!”

Just say it was Mr. Ed’s girlfriend.

And there you have it. It’s raining again today, and I’ve got another birthday party to attend at Alley Hideout. Oh, and I was sad to see that Bonnie Tyler passed away yesterday at the tender age of 75. I’ll leave you with one of my favorite songs of hers:

(Oh, and keep scrolling for the parody version I heard for the first time today)

Yep, I had a good Wednesday. One of the nicer hikes I’ve done in a while took us out in the seldom-visited Cawag area. It’s nice to have someone around with a car to get us there. Thanks for that, Scott! I’ll let the pictures do the talking:

Back home for a nap, a shower, and some brownie baking, then it was off to wish Billy a happy 59th birthday at Alley Hideout.

The Wednesday dart tourney commenced after the party, but I didn’t stick around for that. We moved on to our nightcap at Queen Victoria.

And that’s what a good day for me looks like.

It’s July 2020 in the LTG archives, and I’m feeling a little out of kilter. Another nice date with Jessa, but for some reason I’m holding back. I’d come to regret that someday. Or maybe fate knew that there would be a better option down the road.

In today’s YouTube Shorts video, the Filipina Pea says to me that I’m in the top 1%. Ah, ain’t she sweet to notice.

Let’s go on with these, shall we?

And there you have it. Thanks for coming by!

Luckily, ignorance is bliss, so I’m a happy MOFO. Or so I keep telling myself. But life goes on, for better or worse. And it is better now than it has been.

Now that we have that out of the way, let’s move on. Several commenters have recently reported difficulty accessing the blog. Dr. Greg sent this screenshot from his encounter with the internet gods:

Now, if this had been a one-off, I’d assume the problem was on his end. But other readers in and outside of Asia have had similar access issues. So, I contacted my blog host, HostGator, this morning in an effort to see if the problem was on their end. This was the outcome:

Since no issues have been identified with the server, DNS configuration, SSL setup, or the website itself, it is possible that the users experiencing the issue may have firewall, security software, browser extensions, or network restrictions enabled on their systems, which could be preventing access to the website.

I would recommend asking the affected users to try accessing the site from a different browser, network, or device, and to temporarily check whether any firewall or security settings may be blocking the connection.

Please let me know if you continue to have difficulty.

As for my Sunday, it was a sandwich. The bread consisted of a Decay Dance on one side and the seldom-visited Lux Bar on the other. What was in between, you ask? A solo visit to Cheap Charlies and dinner with Swan at Mangos. You know, pretty much the same old shit I have every day. Let me show you what I mean:

As usual, we took a trike back home from where we finished the Dance and wound up in the most decorated three-wheeler I’ve seen.

Swan had business to attend to at her family compound (she’s building a house there), so I was on my own at beer o’clock. I figured Cheap Charlies was as good as anywhere to have a cold one or three, so I hoofed on over. I was there for almost 90 minutes and was the only customer. Things are definitely slow here in the Barrio.

The gals all know that I don’t buy lady drinks there anymore since the price increased to 250 pesos, so they leave me alone. My waitress made sure my beer bottle was never empty, which I always appreciate. And the money I’d normally spend on drinks goes for food, so the crew was happy with their pancit canton and chicken fingers dinner. I had a dinner date with Swan coming up, so nothing for me this time. I paid my tab, tipped my waitress, and headed up the highway to Mangos.

Queen Victoria is our favorite bar on this side of town, but it is closed on Sundays. Swan suggested Gold Bar, but after our bleh experience there on our last visit, I was craving something different. And Lux was practically next door to Mangos, so we popped in. There were a few other customers up front and some guys playing pool in the rear. We grabbed a table in the middle and ordered our drinks. My beer was cold, and Swan’s wine was the cheapest we’d seen anywhere in a long time.

There were only three or four dancers (I think a couple of others had been tabled with lady drinks), but they were comparatively slim and attractive, certainly better than the Gold Bar crew. The music being played was the kind I like, and the volume was appropriate. We enjoyed our visit to Lux, and I expect we will try to drop in more often when we are on this side of town.

And there you have it. Not much meat in that Sunday sandwich, but I found it tasty regardless.

You want some substance? I came across this disconcerting article that outlines the government’s plans for when a future pandemic arrives. Yep, you guessed it: they learned nothing from the COVID scamdemic and plan to implement the same crap that caused more harm than good. I expect there will be fewer sheep willing to do as they are told next time, though. Hopefully, we won’t have to find out.

From Facebook memories:

And now it is on to the June 2020 LTG archives. I’m doing a two-fer today because both relate to my lamenting some missed opportunities to find the love I wanted. In “An Understanding Ear,” Jessa gives me some honest feedback on what I could have had with her if I had made the effort. The day before, I had an encounter with Ilene that left me feeling helpless. Damn, I sure was (am) a slow learner, but I eventually got it right with Swan. So far, anyway.

Today’s YouTube video talks about the five qualities that lead some to have a dearth of friends. And no, “being an asshole” isn’t one of them.

And now it is time to get down with the funny business:

A man and his wife were working in their garden one day when the man looked over at his wife and said, “Your butt’s getting huge. I bet it’s bigger than the barbecue.”

With that, he proceeded to get a measuring tape and measured the grill. Then he went over to where his wife was working and measured her butt.

“I was right, your butt is two inches wider than the barbecue!”

The woman chose to ignore her husband. Later that night in bed, the husband felt a little frisky. He made some advances toward her, but she completely brushed him off.

“What’s wrong?” he asked.

She replied, “Do you really think I’m going to fire up this big-ass grill for one little weenie?”

How big is her mouth?

And now as I sit here contemplating today’s Hash run, I hear the rumble of thunder outside. Oh well, Vienna Sausage is the Hare, so I wasn’t going to bother doing his trail anyway. The On-Home is at the end of Rizal Extension, which I hate because it is hard to get back to town without transport from there, especially in the dark after drinking at the Hash Circle. So, my current plan is to walk the My Bitch trail to the On-Home, have a couple of beers, then depart when the Circle starts and walk down Rizal back to town. We’ll see what the weather has to say about that come 2 pm.

250 years of freedom. How much longer will it last? At least until the “Democratic Socialists” take over. I imagine I’ll be dead by then, thankfully.

Meanwhile, the sands are still dripping from my hourglass, and this is what they saw yesterday:

Just me and Swan for the Friday hike, and we did a nice enough stroll out to Naugsol to get our steps in.

For our Friday evening on the town, I reckoned a trip to the Maze was in order. Back in the day, I hit all six bars in one night. I guess I’m only half the man I used to be because three bars were plenty for me yesterday.

It may not be much, but I’m not complaining.

Back to the May 2020 LTG archives, and I’m still plodding through posts bitching and moaning about the COVID restrictions. They did finally ease things up a tad, allowing some stores to reopen, but not the bars, of course. They also lifted the ban on alcohol sales (for home use only), so I stocked up on several cases of brew. Then there was a big birthday party at my house (an event I didn’t remember until I came across this post). It was a wild and drunken night that could have ended much worse than it did.

In recognition of the 4th of July, I’m offering up TWO musical YouTube videos today. Both are good and funny:

We are on a roll, so let’s keep rollin’:

And there you have it. When is the last time you listened to “Stars and Stripes Forever”? It had been a decade or so for me, so let’s have another listen:

Regarding the above, I should emphasize that plastic bottles are the worst part of litter. People upstream toss them in the river; they wash down to the bay, and then high tide leaves them on the beach. I understand the ocean is full of them too. Now, when I was a child, soda pop bottles were glass and had a three-cent deposit included in the price. And us poor kids would walk around picking up the discarded bottles and return them to the store to collect the deposit refund. Nice way to earn a little cash.

So, yesterday’s big adventure was getting the power of attorney I had notarized in the mail to the USA. A friend said there was an LBC (a FedEx-like company) on Rizal Street, so I made that the destination of my morning walk. Alas, when I arrived, it wasn’t an LBC; it was a JTExpress. And JT doesn’t do international shipments. The clerk there advised that there was an LBC outlet in Subic town near the marketplace. So, we grabbed a Jeepney and headed out. Found the LBC, did the paperwork, filled the envelope, paid 2200 pesos, and the POA was on the way, scheduled to arrive in 3-5 days. We walked a couple of kilometers back to Calapandayan and took a trike home from there.

Anyway, the epilogue to the story came this morning when my daughter advised that the equity loan she was seeking (the house is technically in my name) had been declined. So, I didn’t need the notarized POA (1000 pesos) and didn’t need to send it (2200 pesos). Damn, that’s a LOT of lady drinks money wasted.

As for the remainder of the day, Swan had a family gathering to attend, so I headed out on my own. Paid a rare visit to Snackbar, but only stayed for one beer. I no longer know anyone there, it seems. Since the storm I’d walked through to get to Snackbar was over, I decided to make my way to Kokomo’s on Baloy Beach. Swan advised she’d meet me there.

A couple of beers later, it was time to move on for some dinner. Swan suggested Vikings, and that was fine by me.

I ordered a plank steak with mashed potatoes. I was surprised by how it was served.

And that’s how we finished our Thursday.

From the May 2020 LTG archives, I write about all I’ve learned on the second anniversary of my life in the Philippines. Not a lot has changed since then, other than finally finding true love.

Here’s a photo of me from the archives showing what the lockdown has done to me:

Who remembers that cop show, “Adam-12”? Well, today’s YouTube video is a short three-minute clip of a grumpy old man complaining about hippies. It made me laugh because in the 70s I was pretty much a hippie. And now in my 70s, I’m a lot like that old fucker.

Are you ready?

Sorry for the politics in that last one. Feel free to change the wording to suit your preferences.

And on that note, I decree this post over and done with.

So, if there’s nothing to get grumpy about, you’ve had a good day! My yesterday qualifies, even if it was nothing special. Even the rain couldn’t dampen my spirits! Some street strollin’ and some beer drinking made the day go down the way I like it. It’s nice to be so easily pleased!

Photos from our Wednesday walk (most of these are courtesy of Scott’s camera):

Then at beer o’clock, we headed for town. Carried our umbrellas, but didn’t need them. Better safe than sorry, I suppose.

I needed to hit the ATM, so we popped into It Doesn’t Matter and used the one located there. Had a free beer card, so I used it before we departed. Finished our evening out at The Jungle and had the usual chillaxin’ experience, but this time with dancers and pool games for distractions.

Yeah, that’s the life I’ve chosen. But it beats living in a nursing home.

Moving on to May 2020 in the LTG archives, and I’m still grousing about the ill effects of the COVID quarantine on the people around me. At least in this post, I mention one unexpected benefit. A female acquaintance asked for some financial assistance. I helped her with her needs, and she took care of mine. That’s either a win-win or a quid pro quo if I ever saw one! Regular commenter Brian made some arguments in support of the lockdowns. I’m curious if he still feels that way given all that has been revealed since then.

Today’s YouTube video features a cute Filipina discussing what makes you rich in the Philippines. She makes some valid points that it is not always about the money. I know I’m living a rich life here, although some might argue I’m wasting it on a frivolous lifestyle. Money may not buy happiness, but it can buy things that make you happy. Like beer.

Smile for me:

Suffered enough? Okay, until tomorrow then.

In the meantime, here’s another update from the old guy.

Not much out of the ordinary to report, just the usual grocery-shopping excursion followed by an Ozempic injection from Dr. Jo. Well, I did need to journey into Subic town to get a Power of Attorney form notarized. It went relatively smoothly, and 1000 pesos later, I walked out with the signed form. Now, I just need to get it back to the USA. I’ve got a lead on doing that as well.

For the evening excitement, we ventured out to Harley’s on Baloy. We don’t get there much, but it’s a pleasant place to sit and enjoy the views.

When it was time for a change of scenery, we walked back into town and stopped by Gold Bar. I wasn’t digging the vibe there for some reason last night. Might have been the four disgustingly fat dancers (yeah, like I’m one to talk) on the stage, but something was off. So, before long we moved on to Queen Victoria and had a much more pleasant time there. Once again, manager Jake sat with us and shared some stories that kept us entertained.

And that’s all there was to my Tuesday. I’m not complaining, though. It’s always good to be alive.

Via Facebook memories, toasting Old Glory at midnight, a Grand Ole Opry tradition.

I’ve finished the April 2020 LTG archives journey, and the posts are all about the escalating insanity taking place under the lockdown regime. I selected this post because it recounts how my final “speakeasy” venue was shut down. It was only later that I discovered the shutdown was a lie; it was just me who was blacklisted. Yeah, I fucked up and invited someone to visit in violation of the speakeasy code of conduct. Shame on me.

For today’s YouTube video, I’m happy to report that Reekay is back! Still demonetized by the Google demons, but it’s good to hear his words of wisdom once again. Yeah, what doesn’t kill us makes us stronger, and it is life’s hard lessons that lead us to a better place.

Smile while you can:

That’s all I’ve got for now.

What the fuck is wrong with me? Well, not exactly my style, but I can take it in small doses at low volume.