Since I only received one response on Twitter (thank you Sarah) to the following question, I thought to myself, "self", I thought, "maybe the blog people would want a crack at this". And so, here is a picture, with my question and #hashtag, which I know full well has no use here:
Yup, that's the kind of gold you're missing over on Twitter. Now you know. Please answer my question in the comments, hopefully in #hashtag form, because being annoying is the next best thing to being liked, and #hashtags in places where they don't work, like in my blog comments, are super annoying. Almost as annoying as mobile phone video taken in the upright position rather than the horizontal. Almost.
Hello there! I'm in a rush but wanted to touch base with the old blog, you know, so I'm just gonna pay homage to the King of Autumnnow that that the leaves are mostly gone.
Here's the best shot I was able to get this year:
The King - October 23
What was interesting to me was that the outer leaves were that bright orange, but the inner ones were an awesome glowy yellow green...
I wondered how that would play out, but I didn't make it back before he was TOTALLY NAKED!
The King Is Shed! Long Live The King! - November 9
I'm hoping to have the time and energy to revive the Autumn Tree Smackdown next year. I'm thinking a nice flexible name that I can use over and over without worrying about a new acronym or numbering system would be good, like the "Sort Of Annual Rantwick Autumn Tree Smackdown", or SOARATS. I think that has a nice ring, even though for me it also brings to mind high-flying rats.
Rather than leaving you with that mental image, SnowFace and Mrs. Rantwick wanted to say hi, so here they are instead:
Well Hello There!
I am SO PLEASED that Mrs. Rantwick is the one with the buggy eyes...
Fridays are supposed to be fun, right? Well I think this fits the bill...
Wish me luck on actually getting fit/strong enough to do my pull up. Right now I am quite overweight, but "fit" thanks to cycling. In case you're worrying that I'm feeling down on myself, don't, because I'm not.
What follows is a quitting smoking story. If that stuff doesn't appeal to you, please bail now.
I have wrestled with smoking for much of my adult life. When I've smoked, it was typically a pack a day or more. Here's my whacko smoking chronology:
Age 16-30: smoker
Age 30-40 or so: quit and happy about it
Age 40-46: On and off smoking, often quitting for months at a time but always falling back into it.
My Dad died (of lung cancer) when I was about 40. I fell off the wagon at that time; my brothers smoke and, well, shit happens, I guess. I hate smoking, but addiction is a very strange thing, as anyone who's ever been addicted to anything can tell you.
Addiction flies in the face of reason, logic, morality, intelligence, common sense, blah blah blah. The thing is, if you've never experienced addiction personally, addicted people seem more like selfish people rationalizing their own selfishness. To a certain extent, maybe that's true; depends on the person, I would think. Still, I think it is safe to say that all addicted people would happily trade their fucked-up (and often selfish) addiction for freedom from their stupid substance ANY DAY.
In case you hadn't noticed, addiction fascinates me. Drugs, booze, smokes, whatever. Addiction touches all of our lives, like it or not. If you have never experienced addiction, you should be thanking your lucky stars HARD. For myself, I am thanking my lucky stars that I have escaped my addiction to nicotine once more, for 5.5 months so far. When you're addicted to something, your fight is never ever ever over. It gets easier over time, but won't ever go completely away, and that's alright, because every day out from under an addiction is cause for celebration.
So, I'm overweight and can't yet do a pull up, but I haven't smoked in a long while and enjoy riding my bike every weekday. I also have a family who loves me and a pretty decent job. I am in no way down on myself, nor should you be, I bet. Look hard at what you have; if you're reading this, I'm guessing it comes to a great deal when you think about it.
Holy crap! This post started with "Friday's are supposed to be fun"! What the hell happened there? Damned if I know, but thanks for reading, for sure.
R A N T W I C K 
