Initial Impressions 2.0 Blog #90: Fall Flavors, So Close But So Far, Birthdays and Books, etc.

1. Things I get way too excited for at this time of year: Monster cereals(Count Chocula, etc.), Dannon’s new seasonal Greek yogurt(it’s toasted marshmallow), Polar Seltzer’s new seasonal flavors(blackberry snowflake is amazing), and yes pumpkin-flavored everything. You can bet that each time I go into a grocery store in October I will be leaving with one or more of those things. Seltzer and Greek yogurt is good, boxes of sugary cereal not so much.


2. One thing I have yet to buy is my annual small pumpkin. I get a pie sized pumpkin, roughly softball-sized, and give it some sort of face. Next up is weeks worth of social media posts featuring photos of said pumpkin in various Halloween-themed areas. But of course there is a shelf life for a Halloween pumpkin. The end comes for my little pumpkin is a horror movie way, typically getting smashed or run over. However don’t be said because this ending doesn’t come until the following June. Yes, the last 3 years I’ve had pumpkins they have lasted well into Spring before yes ultimately becoming smashing pumpkins(thank you).

Last year's pumpkin

3. My birthday is in less than a month. I used to create big social media events where friends and family were invited to gather in celebration. Since I stopped drinking 5 years ago I haven’t done any such thing. The meetups used to be at bars. I don’t want to go hang out in a bar as a sober person but I miss those days of getting to see many people around my birthday. It’s like the older you get the fewer and further between such meetups become. I think that’s one of the biggest things I miss as I get older: the accessibility of loved ones. Social media allows you to be able to contact virtually anybody at anytime, but it’s not the same as in person hangouts. If my birthday was in the middle of summer maybe I’d try to set up a beach party. Sadly it’s in November when temperatures are usually in the 50s and the sun sets before 6. It’s hardly beach weather. So I’ll likely just lament not being able to meet up with people for my birthday but it’s kind of par for the course when you give up the waste of time and money that alcohol is.


4. This entry is a bit of a throwback to the original Initial Impressions. Back then in 2010-2013 I had a lot of posts where I spoke about girls I was interested in. They ranged from ones dating d-bag idiots, to ones that I chased for so long I needed to buy new shoes. It was a lot of cryptic posting, no naming names. This is similar in that there is a girl that is a customer at my work that I have always thought was really cute. After a few years of wondering I finally got the word that yes she is single. She stopped in unannounced one day this week and I made it a point to chat her up more than ever before. I felt great. She then came in again the next day. It was a slow day but of course the only time my boss needed me to do something was the time that she was there. So I missed out on the chance to gain some momentum. I was so disappointed. It was like someone had deflated me as I watched her leave without getting to say a single word. On one hand it was embarrassing that not getting to speak to someone I barely know affected me so much. On the other hand it actually felt good to feel deeply again. It has been years of being career-focused and not even thinking of dating. So we’re 1 and 1 since finding out she’s single. She is set to come in next week. That will be the decider. If we get to talk a lot again maybe I’ll pursue her more. If something comes up again and I don’t speak with her I’ll take it as a sign that it’s not meant to be. Stay tuned.


5. When training people at my day job I connect my phone to the speakers in the gym via Bluetooth. I can have my phone in the next room and still be connected. When I get finished training people I naturally disconnect from the Bluetooth. The funny thing is that those speakers can be temperamental. Several times a week the speakers won’t connect to the phone. It’s become a common thing. However I wasn’t ready for the speakers to refuse to disconnect. This week I got done with my training and disconnected the Bluetooth. I know it disconnected because I clearly heard the speakers make a loud beeping noise to signify it was. I got up to do something when I heard another beep. Out of curiosity I checked my phone and sure enough the speakers had reconnected themselves for some reason. I disconnected them a second time but stood around waiting for the speakers to reconnect again. It didn’t happen, which I was actually disappointed by. I kind of wanted that Three Stooges moment with me as Curly going into the gym and screaming at the speakers to stay disconnected.


6. I have said so many times that from Labor Day through the end of the year is my favorite time. There are so many holidays, birthdays, and such. That being said it is still a shock to the system when the first truly cold weather shows up. Waking up one morning this week with temperatures in the upper 30s was no fun. Mid-October is way too early to turn the heat on so you kind of just deal with it. As luck would have it the temperatures rebounded to be in the 60s with lows around 50. Of course it was accompanied by a major Nor’easter, but hey at least it wasn’t snow...yet.


7. There was nearly a cuteness overload during a walk on the bike path. A father was riding his bike with a baby riding in front of him. It wasn’t just on the handlebars or anything, it was safely harnessed in. This little one had to be no more than 18 months at most. They were screaming with laughter, chatting with people passing by, and waving. I know all of this because they passed me three times within a half hour. I was walking a section of trail that cuts through a golf course and I think the father had parked in the golf course lot and was riding just that length of trail. It was so cute and a perfect addition to what was a great early fall walk.


8. This week was the 24th birthday of my niece Emma. She is my middle of three nieces. I feel like I have different connections with each of my 6 nieces and nephews. With Emma my connections start with smarts and humor. She is super intelligent which I appreciate since when I was a kid I was seen as borderline genius level smart. That being said I didn’t go as all out when it came to college as Emma did. I only got a 2-year degree so I have so much respect for her finishing that chapter in the way I wish I had. Also I feel that our sense of humor are on the same wavelength. We are obviously generations apart but I feel she has the same dry, sarcastic wit that my father’s side of the family has. My Nana called it being ‘sharp.’ So if I make birthday cards for her I know I can make them pretty crazy and she’ll appreciate them. Or if I say buy a roll of toilet paper and sign it like a birthday card she will also appreciate that. I am very proud of who Emma is and all that she has done and will do. Of course I wouldn’t mention crazy birthday cards and not share one.

9. I am glad that I have a vivid and strong imagination. That means that I can see a situation clearly so I don’t need to act it out in reality. What am I talking about? While out for a walk I was going through one of my favorite neighborhoods. A few hundred feet ahead coming toward me was a single man walking four good sized dogs. I could see it was a battle for him to control them. All I could think of was what if something startled or excited the dogs? I could envision them dragging this poor guy all over the street, or tripping him as he goes flying into the air. It would have been a great comedy sketch. I was smiling widely as I passed without incident and waved. Lucky for him I have that imagination, and a little self-control.


10. Fun fact: Three people from my high school class are published authors. Yes, one of them is me. Patrick Hinds had a best-seller that told stories of his life called Failure is Not NOT An Option. He is a very well known podcast host of both True Crime Obsessed and The Golden Girls Deep Dive. Nicole Lesperance has had several successful young adult books published including her newest one A Spell To Wake the Dead. She has a series of book signings on Cape Cod in the fall and I was thrilled to go out to one at the Brewster Bookstore to show my support. It was fun to catch up as I haven’t seen her since we graduated. It was also fun being on the opposite side and just getting to relax while she had to chat and sign books for fans. Obviously I linked to those books so you can order copies. I know they’re not the only ones from my graduating class, but I will say that I am very proud to be in this little club of Class of ‘96 authors with a pair of genuine good and nice people like Patrick and Nicole.

11. A major Nor’easter came barreling through New England this weekend. It was set to bring heavy rain and winds gusting over 40mph. Of course I wanted to get in a little run before the bad weather came so that’s what I did. As is tradition I saw some oddities on my walk. Not sure if it was the weather but I came upon an intersection in a quiet neighborhood. There I saw an older man walking his golden retriever. By walking I mean going in a wide circle but never leaving the intersection. I personally saw him make three laps and he was still going as I got out of his sight. I don’t know if he was worried about going too far and getting caught in a sudden monsoon. The rain didn’t end up starting for another hour or so he would have been fine either way.

Initial Impressions 2.0 Blog #87: Dumpster Transformer, Memory Full, Surreal Validation, etc.

1. Maybe I’m just getting old, but I’m not a fan of people who have Bluetooth headphones hooked up to their phone and then walk around loudly talking. It is one of the most obnoxious things possible. The only thing that makes these types of events worse is when the person talking loudly has a voice that makes your ears bleed. I heard this woman shouting in the aisles of a supermarket, having a conversation. Her voice was one of those nasally, ditsy, Valley Girl voices. Then I saw her and she looked like a Transformer but instead of being some kind of cool machine, she was a dirty old dumpster that also became a human. I couldn’t unsee, or unhear, that.


2. This week, I got an email reminder that my Audible subscription was renewing in a few days. That sounds like a mundane line until I tell you that I totally had no idea I was paying for an Audible subscription. I had likely been getting these payment reminders all along, but the one thing I wasn’t paying was attention. It turns out that what I thought was a free-tier membership, where I got 1 free credit toward an audiobook per month, was actually $14.95 per month. Oh, and it gets better, or worse for me, as this membership has been going on for nearly 2 years. You can do the math. I immediately canceled the membership so I’m in the clear now, but man, that was like a long, drawn-out setup for a joke that wasn’t funny. Oh well, at least I can keep the audiobooks that I got when I thought I was on a free tier. Wicked smart.


3. Getting older means things that were simple when you were younger can now turn into secret injuries. Several weeks ago, I was walking the beach at low tide with some friends. Not wanting to get my shoes wet, I jumped over a little inlet of water still flowing out. I cleared it and felt accomplished, but knew I’d landed a bit awkwardly on my left leg. Flash forward to this week and my hips and lower back were hurting. While getting adjusted by my boss, I mentioned an exercise I did this week that might have caused the pain. He said the issue was likely something from a little while back and we’d just reached the tipping point. That’s when it clicked. Jumping that little stream turned into me needing my left hip to get adjusted. The problem is my mind still thinks I’m 17, or 27, or 37. I feel like I need to forget everything I knew about fitness and diet, while we’re at it, and learn all new stuff. Or just buy clothes made of bubble wrap so I can safely navigate through life.


4. Speaking of getting older. There are times I feel like I have reached the tipping point with the amount of knowledge my brain can hold. I feel at times like a pitcher filling with water, and now any new info is just water flowing out of the pitcher into the sink. Where I notice it the most is at my training job. I have worked with enough different people there that I now can’t remember every detail about each client. This means equipment they might have at home, specific exercises that we have or haven’t done, things like that. On the other hand, I can still remember in great detail a lot of random music and pop culture items from the 1980s and 1990s. So maybe at this point in life, my brain is prioritizing certain knowledge and memories over others. Yes, that random nugget of wisdom about a random song in 1987 gets saved, but whether a client has an injury doesn’t. I’m kidding, by the way, I would remember injuries, just not my own, as seen in the last post.


5. I am used to there being some sort of ambient noise when I record my podcasts. When the weather is nice I have my window open, which is only a few feet from my desk, where I record. Countless vehicles are going by, and way too many large trucks for the road I live on. This week took the cake as far as noises I will need to edit out of the final product. There was a steady barrage of angry blue jays squawking at each other in the trees just outside. It got so bad that I had to mention it on the show in case people hear them, and I can’t edit them all out. The only way I got them to briefly stop was to find hawk calls on YouTube and play them out my window. Sadly, that only got them to go away for a few minutes before it was angry blue jay party time again. Foolish birds.

6. It’s a strange feeling that the Boston Red Sox are likely going to make the playoffs for the first time since 2021 but I really have no interest in it. In fact, this year feels like the least interest I’ve had in sports in general in my lifetime. I’m not sure why that is. It may be because I am always so busy with work that I just don’t have time to become invested in sports. With the Red Sox, I’ve been off the bandwagon with them ever since they traded Mookie Betts to the Dodgers after the 2019 season. The Bruins, I have no interest in, as I really don’t watch hockey. The Patriots have struggled since Tom Brady left, but I do keep my eyes on them from afar. I think the local team I’ve been most invested in over the last 5 years is the Celtics. Basketball was a sport I played growing up in school, so that makes sense. Part of it is that for nearly 20 years, New England had a string of champions, and now all of the teams are mediocre so I feel like I was spoiled for all of those years. It’s kind of like the 1990s all over again, except I’m way past high school age.


7. Provincetown is the only place on Cape Cod where, when I go there, I feel like a tourist. Maybe it’s because it’s an hour drive so I don’t get out there more than a few times a year? I was up there for a wedding this past weekend and took more photos of the scenery than of the event itself. I love my time in Ptown. It’s sort of like visiting Nantucket but without having to get on a boat. It’s interesting how I think of distance. Like I said, it’s an hour to drive to Provincetown, but I’m still on Cape Cod. In less than an hour in the other direction, I can drive to Plymouth, Bridgewater, Fall River, and nearly to Scituate and the Rhode Island border. Yet, all of those places feel so much farther away when I think about it.

Commercial Street, Provincetown

8. Speaking of that wedding, it was for the son of the Lady of the Dunes and his longtime girlfriend. It felt like the cherry on top, completing my story arc in a wild true crime story. The ceremony was at a church at one end of the narrow, busy Commercial Street, and the reception was at a resort hotel on the other end. Lucky for me, the hotel was right next to a parking lot. On a Saturday afternoon, even on the last weekend of summer, that lot was packed. I felt like I was going to end up having to park a few extra hundred yards away, which would mean I’d need to rush to walk to the reception, which was nearly a mile away. I still drove all the way to the end of the parking lot, which was next to the hotel. I was pleasantly surprised to find one open spot right on the road. It was as if I was meant to be there. Oh, and at the end of my time there, when I went to pay to leave, it turned out I had been parked for 2 hours and 56 minutes. Another 4 minutes would have cost me an extra $3. I guess you could say everything was coming up Milhouse, if you get that Simpsons reference.


9. Beyond the parking victory, the wedding was a validating yet surreal experience. I grew up with the mystery of the Lady of the Dunes. It was a story I knew well. If you had told me when I was young that someday the Lady would be identified, I’d have said that’s great, she and her family deserve the closure. If you had told me that I’d be involved in the case in a small way, I’d have said that sounds like it could be a possibility. If you would have told me that I’d be involved in the resolution of the case, her identity as Ruth Marie Terry, oh and that she had a son, oh and you will meet him, get to know him, he will invite you to his wedding, and tell you that your book about his mother’s case was very meaningful and important to the case’s resolution? (Catches breath) I’d have said it sounds like something I’d have written, but was highly unlikely. Yet there I was, sitting among family and friends, at a small, intimate wedding. It was in the front of my mind the entire time I was there, just how surreal and yet fulfilling and validating the experience was.

The church where the wedding ceremony was held.

10. The only downside to the wedding day in Provincetown was my Fitbit being skimpy on calories burned. I don’t know why but I thought that walking 4 miles throughout the afternoon would have earned me a few hundred extra calories burned for food. Nope, not a single one. I love my Fitbit Charge 6, but at times it feels inconsistent. It will register steps when I am sitting and moving my arm, yet its distance calculator will typically be less than what my running app will say if they are both going at once. It does a lot of calorie calculating based on heart rate. I figured I’d have gotten my heart rate up, especially when hustling a mile to get to the wedding ceremony. Oh well, even if the Fitbit didn’t give them to me, I know I burned enough calories to earn that pumpkin cake square. Yes, that was what I wanted to use the extra calories on.


11. For me, I don’t understand how in this day and age people walk on regular roads with their dogs off leash. I saw two on a walk this week. One got leashed once the owner saw me coming, which I appreciated. The other was actually off-leash while its owner was walking along with another dog that was leashed. I have no idea. When it comes to unleashed dogs, first off, you don’t know if someone is going to be driving poorly, and your dog could wander into the road and get hit. Secondly, there is the fact that your dog could get spooked, or just be a menace, and go running after a person, or someone on a bike. Unleashed dogs are every bit as dangerous as distracted drivers. They’re both unpredictable. I’ve had several experiences on bike trails on a run or ride, and some idiot has their dog unleashed, and it either jumps at me or wanders in front of me. I like dogs, I don’t love dogs. But of course, I’ve said it before in this blog, many dog owners are simply selfish and entitled, and believe your world revolves around their dog.