New Needles! And A Little Injection Education

    Once again I find that I have to thank the freaking almighty 'forces that be' that I was able to get a new pack of syringes.  Now that I've finally found a place that I can buy needles from regularly (a challenge in itself but I'll talk more about that tomorrow) I find that I'm still faced with the problem of being able to get there.  Obviously I can't ask my mom, who usually gives me rides to and from work, to just stop real quick so I can run in and buy a pack of syringes!  

    It really sucked this last week because I had a fairly nice amount of dope that I bought, but my needles were shit.  I seriously have so many bruises all over my body from trying to hit myself with dull needles.  Plus there's always the added scare factor of the needles being dirty; contaminated with tiny bacteria that I can't see because they're no longer sterile.  And that of course is what leads to infections and/or abscesses.  Of course, sometimes just "missing" a shot can give you an abscess too.  

    Which brings me to something I learned after doing some research recently.  I learned that when you miss a shot, you should apply heat as soon as possible.  This was news to me since in the past I've always applied ice the injection site,  to reduce the swelling that occurs.  But apparently, even though ice will help minimize swelling, it's heat that will help your body to absorb the missed fluid quicker.  And you want that shot absorbed as quick as possible so that the fluid is not just sitting in the tissues, which leads to abscesses.  Applying heat also speeds up circulation, which in turn speeds up healing as well as infection-fighting potential.  Many sites recommend the use of a heating pad or a hot compress (seriously? who has a hot compress just hanging around the house?  I just use a really hot towel or washcloth.)     

    Of course preventative care is always good to.  It never hurts to wash hands and injection site before doing your shot.  (Honestly I'll admit I only do that about half of the time although I'm trying to be better about it.)  Anyway - preventative washing or not - it sure a lot easier on my poor veins to have a nice new rig that is not only clean and sterile but also sharp (hallelujah!) so that I can hit my veins on the first try.

Welcome Back Jack And Other Thoughts

Well the day after my last post -- I ended up wasting an entire day waiting for my friend Scott to bring me something.   First he said that he'd have to do it on his way to work so I'd have to be up and ready to meet him by 6:45 in the morning.  Of course it didn't matter that I made sure to be ready since HE didn't even wake up until 10:30 in the morning. (So he had to go straight to work)  
    Then he was supposed to meet me around 1:30 and something else happened which also ended up not happening.  After that he called me around close to 3:00 and said that he was going to run an errand for work in about 20 minutes so he'd swing by (nope never did.)
    After that he SWORE that he was going to bring it to me at work.  But while I was there I didn't hear from him and I couldn't get a hold of him.  Finally  he called me shortly before I was finished at work and said he'd be there in 15...... 20 minutes later I got a text saying that his car wouldn't start....Keep in mind that this was all for a freaking 10 sack!!   
    So after all that, I was fucking frustrated, pissed off and fed up and I'd had enough.  I was sick of dealing with all of these crappy flaky people.  When I got home from work I sent Jack a long and apologetic text asking him if he could ever forgive me (for doing nothing but I didn't say that part.) And the next day (yesterday) I met up with Jack again and thank freaking God for that.  I got a decent bag of decent shit for a decent price.  
   
   Of course, I'm not completely oblivious to the fact that the last few days prior to getting back in sync with Jack were the longest I've been clean in MONTHS.  That's kind of scary and the thought DID cross my mind that since I'd already had almost 3 days clean that maybe I should just suck it up and continue to ride the wave and just not get anymore shit.  Of course I quickly dismissed such a reasonable and constructive idea. (I just chocked up that crazy "rational thinking" to the chemical imbalance my brain was suffering due to going 3 days without using.)
    Seriously though, I was looking back over some of my earlier blogs from when I was still on parole and JUST starting to do meth a lot again.  And in one I mention that "it's been a few weeks now since I've gone longer than a day or two without getting high."    Then I go on to say "I have to come down eventually and stay that way for a while......This is not a path I want to keep walking down."
   It's weird how quickly I've shifted out of that cautious mentality and completely back into full-on tweaker mode.  I mean back then I was at least still pretending everyday that it was going to be the last last day that I would do any shit and then I was going to quit again (Yeah - see how well that worked for me?)  
    Shit - I was only smoking it at the time too.  I hadn't used a needle since before I went to prison in 2009.  Now needles are the ONLY way I do it..  I don't even have a pipe.... And when I look back at my previous entries, it's weird because I can see exactly when that changed and how quickly it did.
    I leave off in March talking about how the way I'd really like to do the dope I had left would be to shoot it.  But I didn't have any rigs, and I say something about how that's OK because I don't want to open up that whole can of worms blah blah blah.... Then in my very next entry (which isn't until a month later) I talked about how I'd just gotten another pack of new syringes because the needles I'd been using were so freaking dull that I was bruising the crap out of myself.  
     So.... this is all rather disconcerting.  The craziest part about it is that it seems like that was a LONG time ago - but really it was only 4 months.  
     
    So what?  What does this all mean?  I have no freaking idea.  No - really it means that I need to come up with some sort of plan soon.  Otherwise I'll stay here in my 'Gee-it's-too-bad-that-I'm-a-tweaker-and-not-doing-anything-with-my-life-but-it's-ok-for-now-as-long-as-I'm-high'  mode.  (That's an official psychiatric term, I swear.) 
    What kind of plan?  I don't know..... That's my main problem really; that I don't know what it is that I want anymore so I instead just don't do anything.  I don't know - I probably need to set some sort of short term goals for myself I guess.  The last goal I set for myself was to get a job, and that went pretty well.  I just don't know what..... Ok - so my FIRST goal is I'm going to give myself 1 week to establish a goal for myself - I have NO idea what.  But it will have to be something constructive that will ultimately contribute to improving my life.
    Ok - so I realize this is all kind of cheezy but so what?  I'm cheezy... and I've got to do something different than the same tweaker/wasting my life away bullshit that I've done for the past few years.  
(Easy for me to say right now because I know that I've still got a bag of dope.)  

The F**king Waiting Game

Hurry up and fucking WAIT WAIT WAIT so that I can pay someone for some CRAP CRAP CRAP...

OK, so here's a quick update:  A few weeks ago, Jack, who was my best and most reliable connect got mad at me.  It went something like this:

          I only had $20 to spend on shit, but my friend Brett had $80 he wanted to invest.  So at about 10 a.m. I sent Jack a text message.   It said something along the lines of   'Hey there Jackie! I've got about 80 to 100 reasons why you should come into town! Call or text me ASAP!'


          Most of the day went by with no word from Jack.  I text him again, and tried calling and eventually my friend Brett decided to invest his money elsewhere.
         
          Around 5:30 that evening Jack texts me and lets me know he's almost in my area and that he's going to stop by in a few -which he did.  We drove to this dead-end  street we go to sometimes, where I bought a twenty from Jack and he smoked a bowl with me.  We chatted for a bit, then he dropped me off by my house and left.
         
          Unbeknownst to me, Jack was apparently furious that I'd only bought a 20 when he thought it was going to be more like 80 or 100.  Of course, never once did Jack ask me if 80 to 100 was still what I wanted.  In fact he didn't speak of or attempt to confirm ANY sort of dollar amount with me.
He didn't even bring up the text message I'd sent him.....If he had I would've politely explained to him that in the SEVEN HOURS that it took for him to respond to me, my friend -who'd been the main financial backer for this business arrangement - had made other plans.

    But Jack never mentioned anything to me, I had no idea that he was mad, and when he left, I was still completely unaware that there was even a problem between us.

    Well Jack was mad.  Jack  is mad and consequentially he's apparently not dealing to me anymore.  And although I really hate to admit it, that totally sucks.  He was fairly reliable, always had decent shit, charged me reasonable rates, and not to mention the fact that he would deliver.  I still owe the state of Arizona $5,000 in old fines before I can get my license again.  Being without a car or license it's hard for me to meet up with people.  And my house (or rather, my parents' house) is way back in this little suburban housing development and is 3 miles away from even the nearest Circle K.
 
So without Jack to turn to I find myself having to go back to the old game of spending 5,000 hours just trying to find someone who has anything.  Then once I do I get to spend an additional day or two trying to meet up with them (or waiting for them to meet up with me.)

I HATE THE FUCKING WAITING GAMES!!!  I'm spending literally hours each day just trying to track down crappy 20 bags.  Usually those 20 bags turn out to look more like 10 bags by the time they get to me, and it takes me ten times longer to obtain them then it does to do them.  Then I get to start ALL OVER again the next day.
 
    I really miss Jack.  And after suffering through a couple weeks of frustration I'm wondering if I should just suck it up and call him and apologize (even though I don't feel that I did anything wrong.)  It would be an insincere apology and I would just be kissing his ass in order to get him to start dealing with me again.  I don't know though.... I mean I do have some pride.  And even if I do apologize/kiss his ass/etc it doesn't necessarily mean that he'll start doing "business" with me again.

I don't know.  Bottom line is now I'm back to playing these stupid hurry up and wait games with wannabe dealers and/or people who know someone who knows someone whose heard of someone that might have something....    AARG!!

I'll Take Stupid Tweaker Tricks For 500 Please Alex

     I was just reading a post on Princess Addiction's blog  which got me thinking about something that happened a few years back; something that resulted in me accidentally 'outing' myself as a tweaker to a complete stranger. 
     I'd just done an issue at my friend Serena's house.  However I'd had trouble finding a vein and  due to my multiple unsuccessful pokes combined with the fact that sometimes I'm a bleeder - I ended up with some dried blood in the crook of my arm.  Well I was pretty high and a little sleep deprived.  And before I could remember to wash the dried blood off of my arm, I was apparently distracted by some incredibly interesting and  probably meaningless task. 
    A little bit later in the spirit of drug-inspired spontaneity Serena and decided to walk down to the Dollar Store and the nearby Salvation Army.  We'd put on jackets before we left so my bloody arm was now hidden as well as forgotten. 
    Well when we got to the Salvation Army, they had the heat turned up to like 500 degrees. So I absentmindedly took off my jacket and kind of carried it around draped over my arm.  I was still oblivious at this point and although the jacket was hiding the blood on my arm that was purely by accident.  So I went to the cashier (Some 40 year old guy with a long brown ponytail, glasses, and a smoker's cough) to buy the $3 CD I found.  I had to transfer my jacket to my other arm so that I could dig into my right jeans pocket for my money. 
    It wasn't until I held out the $3 to him  that I was horrified to see my blood-crusted arm screaming for attention as it stretched out all on display between he and I.  The blood was kind of crusted/smeared right there on the crook of my arm - the universal shooting-up spot.  He saw it (you couldn't really miss it) and he sort of shook his head and said "Okay then" as he took my money.  Then he proceeded to glare disapprovingly over the top of his glasses at me while he    S *L *O *W *L *Y    got my change for me.  He just held my gaze the whole time and then at the end of our transaction he kind of snorted and said "Okay..." again. 
    I laugh when I think about it NOW. At the time though I got ALL SORTS of freaked out... and paranoid, lol.  I dragged Serena out of the store in a panick and forced her to practically run with me all the way back to her house.  Looking over my shoulder the whole way for the whole way for the cop cars and helicopters  I was sure were coming after us..... 



P.S    To "all" my readers (all 4 of you lol) I'm now on Facebook  ("Ooohhh"  "Aaaah") 
So go ahead and  visit me there if you're so inclined.... Feel free to add me as a friend., or post on my wall and/or whatnot....

Near-Death Experience of a Cat

    Ok, so on a completely un-meth related topic, my cat almost got eaten by a coyote the night before last!!  When the doorbell rang it was 11pm so I was thinking that it was weird for anyone to stop by so late.  Then I heard someone say the words "..black cat.." and the first thought I had was that someone had accidentally run over my cat with their car.  I bolted to the front door just as my mom was running inside to get me.
     My cat was sitting where the coyotes had dropped him but he was freaking out and growling at everybody and not letting anyone get close to him.  The neighbor lady and her husband were pointing to the other side of the road (which was too dark to see anything) and she was saying that the coyotes were still there.  I just swooped up my cat quickly and he clung to me shaking and twitching and panting heavily.
    I spent the rest of that night freaking out and crying a lot and trying to soothe my sweet cat.  He was walking funny and had blood in his mouth (I never DID figure out what that blood was from) and he was breathing hard for hours.  He didn't want ANYONE to touch him (which is weird because he's normally a super-affectionate cat) and he crawled/wobbled away into the spare bedroom and went to the back of the closet to lay down.  I was terrified he was trying to be alone so that he could die.
    I had no idea what kind of damage the coyotes had done.  I only knew that they hadn't had him long.  Our Super Awesome Next Door Neighbor (who I learned that night is named Gayle) I think that she was in bed already when she heard the scuffling of some animals by her window and said she KNEW for some reason that it was coyotes chasing after a cat.  So basically, she bolted out of bed and ran outside (By then she said she'd heard my cat screech once so she knew for sure what was happening.) 
   When she opened her door she saw two coyotes - a large one and a smaller one - running away; the smaller coyote had my cat in its mouth.   Gayle actually chased after the coytes shouting and clapping her hands.  Thankfully this startled the coyotes and they dropped Frankie and ran to the other side of the road  (Just out of the visibility of the streetlight.). Then I guess they just waited over there and watched to see what Gayle would do.  She was afraid to leave my cat because she knew the coyotes would run back over and just grab him again.  Luckily she had made enough ruckus that her husband came outside and she had him stand guard between my cat and the coyotes while she went to ring our doorbell and see if he was ours. 
     For the entire night afterwards my cat was displaying signs of being in shock.  He's 11 & 1/2 years old and so I was worried because shock can often be fatal to cats.  Sometimes after surviving a traumatic and/or stressful experience the physical effects of shock that follow can end up killing the cat.  ( Read more about that here. )
    By the next morning though he was responding a little more to me and even faintly purring when I'd gently stroke him.  A trip to the vet and it turns out he escaped with only two small puncture wounds and a lot of soreness.  He's my little miracle.  After this I've decided that he's going to have to become an indoor cat from now on.  I don't know how he's going to like that - but this was too close of a call. 
   After doing some research I learned that May-August is the time of year when coyotes are rearing their pups.  So there is an increased and more desperate need to find food for both the adult coyotes as well as the quickly-growing pups.  I suspect that if it had only been one coyote, Frankie would've been able to hold his own and probably would've gotten away.  However it's probably likely that the second coyote surprised him and/or helped distract him while the other one got close enough to grab him. 
     Either way, I think he probably used up at least 2 or 3 of his 9 lives.   I'm just so grateful he survived.  I would've been heartbroken to have lost him. 
On that note I'd better sign off and get my ass to bed. 

      I've really got to start going to bed before there's light starting to show in the sky... (sigh)
 
Below are a couple of  videos involving cats vs coyotes.  The first one has a happy ending (for the cat) and in the second one I believe the cat is already dead. 
   In the first video you can see how the two coyotes are kind of working together in the way that one coyote is quite obviously trying to keep the cat distracted while the other approaches (albeit slowly) from behind. 
   The second video is just to demonstrate how easily a coyote can scale a wall.  That video took place in Scottsdale, AZ which surprised me because Scottsdale is a pretty urban area... and note the ease with which the coyote jumps the wall.

First video: (happy ending)

Second video (cat appears to be already dead)  :

(And by the way, for that last video I'd like to know who the freaking asshole is that just sits idly by and videotapes a coyote killing/taking away his or his neighbor's pet!!!!)