![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.vicsocotra.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/07\/070922-LIT.jpg\")
<\/p>\nEditor’s Note: This just in from Marlow in his Coastal Empire!<\/p>\n
– Vic<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Thus far during my life I have<\/p>\n
put on and taken off my underwear at least 26,500 times
\nhad ~7.9 million heart beats
\na FICO score > 825
\n0 parole or inmate numbers that I know of
\nparticipated in disbarring 2 lawyers
\nridden > 300,000 miles on various motorcycles
\nhad 5 passports
\nlived in 18 houses
\nhad 7 different employee numbers
\nworn at least 7 different personal security badges
\ncursed too many times to count accurately
\nsampled northward of 4500 bottles of wine
\nhad 2 daughters, 1 stepson, and 3 grand children
\nbeen infinitely lucky to have W in my life; in bowling terms, she’s the 265 to my 217
\nhad cards from 18 credit card companies
\nhad 8 library cards
\nnever had a winning lottery ticket
\nvisited 16 countries
\nseen 3 conflicts during my military service
\nway too many online accounts and way too few unique passwords
\nalways split aces playing casino blackjack and won close to 60% of those hands
\nmissed 100% of my departed friends
\nalways liked Beethoven’s 9th symphony
\nhad an infinity of good times and moments
\nbeen stunned by man’s infinite capacity for stupidity
\nunderstood from an early age that 99 percent of all statistics only tell 49 percent of the story
\nunderstood that BS at the speed of light is still BS (an iron clad rule of the internet and the pre-internet intelligence world)
\nnever played my stereo systems at 9 — always dialed them to volume level 10
\nseen the truth of the “figures lie and liars figure” proposition more times than I care to admit
\n1 brother who successfully survived living 10 years in apartment 1313 in a Chicago high rise
\nnever worn a digital watch
\nlived most of my working life not with 8 hour, 5 day per week, 9-5 jobs but 10, 12 and 14 hour per day, 6 or more days per week ones; this put me in abiding contact with the deeper realities and actualities of life; yet I am finding that living until you die is hard work too
\nnever trusted the weirdly suspicious and solitary prime numbers who are just too special to hang out with ordinary numbers; they’re sorta like gurus and self-appointed lower case g gods and hucksters
\nracked up more assists than points scored during the game of life
\nalways liked my 18th birthday best — could finally legally drink 3.2 beer, vote, join the military, find my own way — all without parental permission
\nenjoyed late night hours after 11 PM here in the Empire, sometimes pouring myself and W a glass of wine while sitting out in the side garden — with the moonlight flooding in and the sounds of the city — people’s front porch music and conversation, automobiles, curses, the occasional gunfire, dogs barking, cats meowing, motorcycles rumbling, police sirens screaming . . . reaffirming that we are all in this together<\/p>\n
Lucky I’m sane after all I’ve been through
\nSitting still in this heat, just trying to stay cool
\nI can’t complain but sometimes I still do
\nLife’s been good to me so far<\/p>\n
-Marlow<\/p>\n
PS Some of us older ones say that people are usually in reality off a bit worse than in our numbers. If true, perhaps it’s poetic justice.<\/p>\n
Copyright 2022 My Aisle Seat
\nwww.vicsocotra.com<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Editor’s Note: This just in from Marlow in his Coastal Empire! – Vic Thus far during my life I have put on and taken off my underwear at least 26,500 times had ~7.9 million heart beats a FICO score > 825 0 parole or inmate numbers that I know of participated in disbarring 2 lawyers […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[20],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-24241","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-island-times"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.vicsocotra.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24241","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.vicsocotra.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.vicsocotra.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vicsocotra.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vicsocotra.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=24241"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.vicsocotra.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24241\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":24243,"href":"https:\/\/www.vicsocotra.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24241\/revisions\/24243"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.vicsocotra.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=24241"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vicsocotra.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=24241"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vicsocotra.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=24241"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}