Jamie Wakefield

Thanks to the fact that I’m a blogger, I can look back on just about any time in my life and see it in print. I just read about moving to Darktide in AC. I read about my new template. I read a letter to my sister I wrote seven years ago. All in search for my entries about losing weight. I work out pretty hard these days. At least, I like to think so. But looking back on my journal I see that I am fooling myself. Losing weight is hard. It is hard work. No matter what country I am in, I smile at the people who have no idea how to lose weight. They hop on a bike with a book, pedal nonchalantly for thirty minutes and proudly proclaim “I did thirty minutes on the bike.” Really? Why aren’t you sweating then? I run three times a week and I think I’m doing good. Which I am. But if I want to lose the weight that I really want to lose, I need to do more than double that. Twelve years of marriage and ten years of Magic and video games bloated me up to 213 lbs. My brother came home for thanksgivin...

There is no such thing. However, I have not been in the mood to write and my "Teresa from Tijuana" entry came out much less funny than I had hoped and I didn't have an ending so that will have to come next week. Sorry about the lack of updates. Ferrett, you are my God. (Well, you and Piers Anthony.) Because they both espouse the saying: If you want to be a writer - WRITE! Which has long been my belief as well. Epic fail by me this week. Going to a PTQ on Sunday at Evolution, wish me luck. Hope everyone has a good weekend.

I was going to say “they’re funny”, but they’re not. 1. Putting Duck tape over someone’s mouth stops them from talking. It doesn’t. Try it. You can use your tongue to push it off your lips quite easily. You can also just open your mouth and the tape will let go. Try that too. The only way Duck tape would act as a silencing agent would be if you wrapped it around someone’s head multiple times. Maybe not even then. 2. Stuffing a cloth in someone’s mouth acts as a gag. Again, not even a little. A tongue can easily push the cloth out and allow you to shout. Now, Duck tape plus cloth plus wrapping around someone’s head multiple times would probably do the trick. 3. You don’t fall to the ground and die instantly when shot in the heart. The heart provides life giving oxygenated blood to your organs, to your muscles and to your brain. The brain lives for six minutes after it has been deprived of oxygen. It will remain conscious for two or even three of those minutes. If you’re shot in the hear...

The whole “Let me show you how much responsibility a baby is” plan is totally back-firing. Our dachshund Thor came back into our lives in June. I struggled to find a home for this wonderful dog for two months and then gave up. He is, and always has been, bonded to me for his twelve years of existence. In the two months he was with Wendy and I, he burrowed and snuggled his way into our hearts. Giving him up to someone else would have been like removing a limb. Every now and then, Wendy and I talk about if we want a baby and how that will change our life. “Ha ha!” I thought. “We will bring the little dog of thunder to Spain and you will see how much of an impact such a responsibility can carry. He will change our lives. No longer will be free to do whatever we want when we want.” Monday morning I woke up in Seville petting a lump in the blanket dreaming it was Thor. Seville was great, except, we both missed the little dog who was staying at Lena and Stefan’s for the weekend. They fed him...

I am not friends with Chris. I know of him, and he of me, but we do not congregate in the same circles. We pass each other in the halls and occasionally say hello, having been in the same grade for all of our lives. We are juniors now and everything has changed. I wonder if he will notice the difference in my eyes? With a deep breath and a sigh, I approach him at his locker between classes. Chris is taller than me. Everyone my age is taller than me. He has brown hair, eyes like deep pools of dark water and is on the soccer team, a sport I despise. He is in theatre and hangs with a completely different crowd than I do. “Chris?” “Yeah? Oh… Hi Jay, what’s up.” “Well, I’m about to become ‘that strange guy everyone talks about’ and I’m not looking forward to it.” “…okay…” “I want you to think of all that you know of me since we were in kindergarten. I don’t have the rep of a liar, a cheat, a bully, anything. I’m just a guy. Some would call me a good friend that they trust. I’ve never betray...

This should give you a better idea of how big the Dog of Thunder (Thor) is. He is is sitting with our friend Lena at their Oktoberfest party. He's not fat, just big boned. Honest.

I try not to be too political on this blog but I feel this needs to be said. My sister has returned from the hospital after a week long battle with pyelonephritis which is a fancy word for a kidney infection. From her Facebook posts it seems she had similar experiences in the emergency room that Marilyn and I have had. They did their level best to ignore her until her fever spiked to 106. I can only say that Wendy and I have never had such experiences in Spain and when comparing notes with our friends in France, they haven’t had them there either. Anyone who tells you national health care will automatically make things worse is flat out lying to you. It COULD make things worse, I’m not denying that, as some countries do have long waiting lines or shortages or other problems. But it doesn’t have to be that way. There are countries that have national health care and it works a lot better than the system we have in the US. Wendy and I have never waited in the emergency room in Spain for l...