Alphabet words...

For much of my adult life I always used the same old words as replacements for letters when reciting long serial numbers or VINs over poor phone connections. For instance, “A as in apple, B as in boy, C as in Charlie,” etc. It got tedious. So I came up with my own list of alphabet words to use in those circumstances. This was a fun little project as many of these words are some of my favorites.

A – absinthe, alabaster,

B – bullcrap, bipartisanship, belligerent,
     bituminous,

C – chicanery, caterwaul, catheter, crackpot,
     clobber, chortle

D – dreadful, dismal, debacle

E – eunuch, ecclesiastical, epiphany

F – falderal, fatalistic, fisticuffs, frolic

G – gastropod, gorgonzola, gallivant, grotto,
     grimace

H – hoodwink, hideous, haggard, haphazard,
     highfalutin, hullaballoo

I – inconceivable, ignominious, irascible, ilk

J – jibber, juxtapose, jettison, juggernaut

K – kiosk, kibosh

L – lurk, languish, lollygag, lunatic

M – malarkey, malevolent, malodorous, moniker,
     maudlin

N – nincompoop, nocturnal, nebula, nitpick,
     newfangled

O – odious, oratorical, opulent

P – platypus, proton, porous

Q – quarantine, quixotic, quorum

R – rapscallion, ramshackle, rube,

S – skullduggery, scurry, scapegoat, skedaddle,

T – tommyrot, tomfoolery, tout, treacle,

U – Underdog, urchin

V – villain, vaudeville, Vesuvius

W – Whippersnapper, whirligig, whatchamacallit

X – xenophobe, the X-chromosome

Y – yammer, yonder, yin-yang

Z – zilch, zoinks

The problem, of course, is that it helps when the person on the other end of the phone conversation is a good speller. For instance, catheter and caterwaul sound like they could start with the letter “K”. And xenophobe sounds like it could start with “Z”. You get the picture.

To carry it a bit further, this could come in handy if you want to confuse people. You could recite the serial number 59PXPG as follows: “Five. Niner. Pneumonia. Xenon. Photograph. Gnome.”

Go ahead and come up with your own list of words. Why? Because it’s nice to be able to throw out a curveball every once in a while. You might even be able to come up with the name of a blog from your own list of favorite words.

It Hasn't Been A Good Year...

This blog came about as the result of a New Years Resolution. I rarely make them, and even more seldom do I end up following through. But this one was suitably vague and thus achievable. My resolution was simply, "Do More". There ended up being several parts to this, which I'll touch on in future posts, but this post is largely about the creation of this blog, and why it hasn't been developed.

For me, "doing more" involved finally doing some of the things that I'd been thinking about doing for a while. One of those things was to start a blog. I'd thought about this off and on over the years, and had come up with lists of topics that I would like to write about. Hobbies and interests mostly. Movies, books, music, photography, traveling, and motorcycles were all on the list. I did not make a list of things that I wouldn't write about. Frankly didn't feel the need. If I had made such a list though, it would largely have included many of the things that ended up happening to my family and me this year.

My dad found out that he had lung cancer. He had an operation that successfully removed the tumor, but he ended up spending over a month in the hospital due to various complications. He eventually went home, but a couple weeks later had a seizure. He then went to the hospital and found that he had developed brain cancer. Back in the hospital he went and spent another month or so getting radiation and physical therapy. He came home and was doing extremely well until around the Fourth of July he had an hour long seizure, rapidly went downhill, and died a couple weeks later.

While he was dealing with his various cancers, I had my own health problems. I had developed a biliary obstruction due to a rare liver disease. I was severely jaundiced, my bilirubin levels eventually rising to 37. (A level of 1 is normal.) I was refered to the Mayo Clinic and found that I had bile duct cancer. After much back and forth between many doctors I went in for surgery in June. The surgeon found that the cancer had spread beyond the point where surgery would be helpful.

You'll notice that these are not positive things. And I did not want to put sad or negative things on the blog. For even if I wasn't really sure what all exactly I wanted to write about, I did know that I did want to keep it positive and light hearted. So, I didn't put anything on the blog during those months.

I feel pretty good now. Since western medicine can't do much for me at this point, my only option is to pursue alternative therapies. I've done a lot of research on the topic, and everything that I've read says that a healthy diet is essential. So, I've been trying to eat healthier. I'm also taking a large number of different supplements and staying positive. My goal is to prove the doctors wrong.

So, as long as I'm feeling good and am somewhat motivated, I decided to resurrect the old blog. Possibly I'll be better at posting things now than I was when I started it.