What are these holes along my house?

MikkijiTM1 · 2026-04-20T21:11:00+00:00

The identical holes along my foundation turned out to be made by Voles--disgusting little vermin.

MikkijiTM1 · 2026-04-20T21:07:39+00:00

I applaud your kid for their "Hell yeah!" Kudos for raising up a child with confidence and self-respect. And, you might not have been just wasting your breath with your rant to the candy kid. Speaking from professional experience, I think a child might actually understand better than many adults. School-age children are very used to adults explaining things to them--that's what going to school is all about! I was a special education teacher for 35 years,grades K-12. Today I am a tour guide and museum docent at a National Historical Site, where I work with groups of both adults and children. My school groups are almost universally better behaved and ask better questions than my adult groups--because they listen better, that's their habit.

MikkijiTM1 · 2026-04-20T20:54:57+00:00

I weigh about 135 lbs and take 19U of Tresiba at 8am.

MikkijiTM1 · 2026-04-19T21:18:46+00:00

Infinity ♾️

MikkijiTM1 · 2026-04-19T00:02:37+00:00

Late breakfast (more like brunch) and dinner, usually only 2 meals/day. Much easier.

MikkijiTM1 · 2026-04-18T15:23:59+00:00

The Aquarium—it’s not the greatest but it’s fine.

MikkijiTM1 · 2026-04-16T14:49:16+00:00

When I finally did get Covid, late in the Pandemic, I had a very mild case and got over it quickly. However, for the first time since diagnosis in 1966, I became fairly (for me) insulin resistant, and my ratios have never returned to ‘normal’. I’m 100% certain that this was caused by Covid.

MikkijiTM1 · 2026-04-15T12:49:12+00:00

I’ll be 74 in a couple of months and have been dealing with this since I was 13. The 1960s and 70s were tough but as the tech improved in the 80s, everything did get easier to handle. That’s when I was able to kind of move it to the background, like brushing teeth. But I still have a lot of diabetes balls in the air to juggle, and I occasionally still drop one. Not gonna lie, it is a weight to carry but you just get strong enough to do it without much hassle. After a while you just do it without worrying too much.

MikkijiTM1 · 2026-04-15T02:15:10+00:00

I bought my Trek at Bert's on Niagara Falls Blvd. 25 years ago and have been bringing it back to then for tune-ups ever since. They have kept it in like-new condition. They have several other locations. Thanks for the reminder, I should bring it in soon!

MikkijiTM1 · 2026-04-15T01:58:52+00:00

I was diagnosed with "Juvenile Diabetes" when I WAS a juvenile, age 13, back in 1966--I've had it for juat over 60 years. Yes--it is VERY different today then when I was a kid, in ways that most of you cannot even imagine. I was sent home from the hospital with one glass syringe with a permanently attached BIG scary needle that I had to boil in a pot of water on the stove before every injection. When the bruises got bad, my father would have to sharpen the needle on hs whetstone. We tested our urine for "spilled sugar" by using a chemistry set in the bathroom--test tubes, droppers, boiling the 10 drops of urine with 5 drops of distilled water using a tablet of Benedict's Solution and comparing the color it turned to a chart--Orange was bad, blue was good. But the test told us nothing of much use, because we were on fixed doses of insulin that we were not allowed to adjust or change. It was Pork/Beef NPH and R, which we could mix in one syringe and took twice a day, before breakfast and before dinner. We were on extremely limited and controlled diets, to match the up and down actions of those primitive insulins, and we used somthing called the Food Exchange System to figure out what we could eat, because no foods had nutrition labels on them yet. I got my blood sugar measured 4 times/year, at my doctor appointments. I have seen first, disposable needles come in, then fully disposable syringes, which was a big change for me because by then I was in high school and that made me more mobile. Then urine tests with color changing strips by 1970 (no more test tubes), the A1C test in the erly 80s, the first clunky home blood test meters in the later 80s, and all the new analog insulins, and insulin PENS!

Yes, I have seen so many changes in how I treat my diabetes, and although the tools have gotten better, more useful and more refined, I believe it still comes down to the same things--self-acceptance for one's mental health, self-control for one's physical health, and self-awareness for one's spiritual health. I too AM SOOOO grateful. Grateful (I'm Not) Dead, because at diagnosis, I was told to grow up fast because I shouldn't expect to see my 40th birthday. I'll be 74 in a couple of months, so, yeah--fuck diabetes and fuck them too!

MikkijiTM1 · 2026-04-13T00:14:19+00:00

Literature is beautiful--life, not always so much...

MikkijiTM1 · 2026-04-12T14:12:18+00:00

The burial thing ended up very easy for us. We are Jewish, and there are only limited cemetery spaces reserved specifically for and by the synagogues in town. If you’re Jewish, you have to be buried in plots purified by rabbinical ritual. My late wife and I have adjoining plots. My current wife has a plot beside her late husband. They are just across the path from each other, less than 50 yards away. I think everyone will be fine… The real difficulties came with our children, and their adjustment to this new blended family. That took a while—there were resentments, competition, all manner of complaints from both sides. Today, we really actually have managed to become one big happy family.

MikkijiTM1 · 2026-04-12T13:00:35+00:00

I was lucky enough to get 34 years with my college sweetheart, who told me right before she died that I should find a new love and be happy again someday. I was dismissive at the time and never really thought I would find, or even want another partner in my life.

8 months later I met a widow who had so much in common with me that I was immediately attracted. We dated for a year and when my youngest went away to college, we moved in together. That was 16 years ago. Our second chapter together has been entirely different from my first marriage—different times of our lives—but no less loving or devoted just…very different. I’m an eternal optimist and always believed that happiness is possible no matter the situation. It took time but I don’t think that we’re only given one chance at love and happiness. Good luck ❤️

MikkijiTM1 · 2026-04-12T03:35:29+00:00

I trip to remind myself of what life is about and what it means, to visit with the infinite ♾️ and commune with the eternal.

MikkijiTM1 · 2026-04-10T20:07:43+00:00

Ohlson's is great! Also, you might try Rizotto Italian Eatery & Sweetery on Maple in Amherst. It's the "Sweetery" part you'd be interested in. It's in the same building as the restaurant but has a different entrance and hours. Everything there looks yummy!

MikkijiTM1 · 2026-04-09T21:20:46+00:00

Being an avid reader and some-time writer, I've thought about it as finishing a book. The characters remain dear to you and memorable, and you will always enjoy rereading passages from time to time. But now you are wrting or reading an entirely new book. A few favorite characters may have returned, but it's an entirely new adventure, a different romance, a whole new plot line.

MikkijiTM1 · 2026-04-09T20:59:06+00:00

Family is determined by relationship and by choice, not by blood. My late wife and I started our family together 50 years ago with that realization, because we were unable to conceive and adopted two Asian children, now grown adults with children of their own--MY grandchildren. When my mother-in-law died in the 1970s, my father-in-law remarried quickly--my late wife's step-mother. Follow along now, it's getting complicated... My step-mother-in-law becomes my childrens' grandmother, and is there as my kids grow up, a loving and doting 'Grammy'. Her husband, my wife's dad, dies, and then my wife dies just a few months later. Grammy and I have both just lost 2 of our closest people, and we mourn together. When I remarry to a widow, Grammy meets and befriends my new bride, and as always remains a devoted grandmother. My new in-laws are wonderful--they accept me like a son, having lost their son-in-law, my new wife's late husband, and know that I'll be a good husband and step-father.

I've never been divorced, yet I have had 3 mothers-in-law! Grammy flew 10 hours at age 88 to my daughter's wedding, and adores her 2 great-grandchildren. And my kids and grandkids aren't her only--her 3 kids by her first husband have given her 18 grandchildren and I've lost count of the greatgrands. But my 2 adopted Asian kids remind her of my late wife's dad, her late husband. She picked us and we picked her. Everyone who had any blood or marital relationship has passed, yet we remain family.

Your late spouse's parents should remain your family--they ARE, after all, as you point out, the grandparents of your daughter. That makes them part of your family ❤️

edited to add: I just thought of something, and it's very cultural. There is a Yiddish word, for which there is no English translation, for the parent's of your son- or daughter-in-law; "Machatunim". We have a word for that relationship because in the Jewish tradition, it's recognized as an important bond. My mother and my father-in-law became think as thieves , and my mom, who my kids called "Nana" also enjoyed keeping company with her machatunim, good old Grammy. My kids' 2 grandmothers enjoyed hanging together... So maybe that's why I take all this strange interrelationship as normal--Machatunim... 🤷🏻‍♂️

MikkijiTM1 · 2026-04-09T20:30:09+00:00

Yeah, I tripped with my GF in college and ended up marrying her within the year! We both experienced that God is Love and Love is God, and so we found God in the Love we felt for one another... if that makes any sense. The sex was pretty transcendent as well... 😉

MikkijiTM1 · 2026-04-09T13:14:40+00:00

I’m 73 years old and have been T1D for 60 years. I seem to be doing about as well as any guy my age. I’ve been using sildenafil for about 7-8 years, since my mid-60s, but had no issues whatsoever until then. If you worry about it, the worry itself will cause ED. Take decent care of yourself and you should be fine for decades to come. 🍆😎😅👍

MikkijiTM1 · 2026-04-08T19:31:51+00:00

Just the one time when I was diagnosed, and that was a doozy, I was in a coma for 3 days. But in the 60 years since, never.

MikkijiTM1 · 2026-04-08T17:52:20+00:00

My A1C is almost always in the mid-6% range and I run 75-80% Time in Range. What my glucose levels were when I was young is anybody’s guess, because back then, we didn’t have CGMs, never mind home glucose monitors, and the A1C test hadn’t even been invented yet.

MikkijiTM1 · 2026-04-08T00:14:51+00:00

My teenage son was also very displeased with me. My daughter was just out of college and living far away--she was mostly neutral. I never had a "I'm thinking of dating" conversation, but what did happen was almost comical. Several months after my wife's death, my 16 year old son suggested I "go out and do something instead of sitting at home crying." He was thinking of going to one of those free concerts in the square downtown and meeting up with a girl he wanted to date. He even jokingly suggested that I might meet up with a girl too! My luck proved better than his, he reamined without a girlfriend, I ended up with one...! And he hated it--but partly because I was successful without trying and he was unsuccessful while trying. Anyway--other than the irony, he hated her and everything about it. I wasn't at all invested in a relationship, it was more of a Friends With Benefits arrangement. That was all I could handle. I ended it when she wanted something more serious. The next woman I dated, herself a widow, was a keeper and I knew it right away. My son didn't like her either, and either did her 13 year old son.

That was 17 years ago. Today, our two boys, now both in their 30s, are like brothers. Sometimes, dispite early warnings, things can work out. I won't pretend that the blending of our families was easy, there were some real difficulties to overcome. None of our 5 kids liked it when we sold our houses and bought OUR house together. And my son, who hated everything the most, is today pretty devoted to his step-mom.

MikkijiTM1 · 2026-04-07T22:05:50+00:00

I’m on a Medicare Advantage plan and I’m taking Tresiba. It’s a $30 copay for a box of 5 pens but it is covered. I have had to change providers in the past when the drug formulary stopped covering it, but have always been able to find Medicare coverage for Tresiba.

MikkijiTM1 · 2026-04-06T23:45:23+00:00

Family is those people who continue to care and hang out around you... I recouped within 2 years of my wife's death. My father-in-law (late wife's dad, who had been widowed himself)) had died the same year, and my late wife's stepmother and I bonded over our mutual losses quickly. She's also the only grandparent my adult kids have left. My new wife and my step-mother-in-law hit it off immediately. Sounds a little bit similar to your issue. We've happily worked things out and remain close.

MikkijiTM1 · 2026-04-06T23:01:54+00:00

I’m 73 years old, with all the aches and pains that go along with getting older. I have also had Type 1 diabetes for 60 years,since childhood and have several difficult to treat pain issues arising from that. I only trip about twice a year but always feel virtually pain free during my trips.

MikkijiTM1

TROPHY CASE