My Pill Box is My Calendar: The Daily Health Fiasco

​You know you’ve officially entered the "What The Fiasco" stage of aging when you stop looking at a clock to see the time and start looking at your plastic pill box to see what day it is. "Oh, look, the Tuesday slot is empty. I guess I didn't hallucinate Monday after all."

​I’m 63. If this is what 63 looks like—requiring a heating pad and a 15-minute calisthenics routine just to peel myself off the mattress—I am terrified of what 73 has in store. I have zero retirement savings, a future Social Security check that won't cover a high-end LEGO set, and a plan to keep working until I literally drop.

​Welcome to the medical side of the Fiasco.

​The Root of the Evil: Adult ADD

​If my life were a car, Attention Deficit Disorder (ADD) is the guy who installed the steering wheel upside down. I didn't even realize I had it until my mid-thirties, but it explains every disaster in my wake:

• ​The Weight: I’m a professional yo-yo dieter because I have the patience of a caffeinated squirrel.
• ​The Projects: I’m a world-class daydreamer. I have enough unfinished projects in my head to fill a warehouse, but here I am, just hoping you're still reading this.
• ​The Consequences: I live "in the moment," which is a fancy way of saying I do stupid things now and let "Future Me" deal with the wreckage. Well, "Future Me" is here now, and he’s ticked off.

​The Structural Collapse: Arthritis and Hips

​I’ve had back issues since I was 25, but now moderate arthritis has joined the party. It’s a literal pain in the butt. I’m currently navigating the house with a cane, which makes me look distinguished but feels like a fiasco. Hu

My left hip has decided it no longer wants to participate in society. I’ve had to surrender to slip-on shoes, because if a shoe has laces, it’s dead to me. But socks? Socks were a challenge until I invented The Cup & Tong Method™. I fold the sock over the rim of a large plastic cup, slide my foot in, and then use a pair of kitchen tongs to haul it up like I’m retrieving a hot dog from a grill. It’s effective, it’s humiliating, and it’s a total fiasco.

​The Pharmacy in a Plastic Box

​Between the high blood pressure (fueled by coffee, energy drinks, and my own temper), the heartburn (which Keto helps, if I could focus long enough to buy a steak), and the prostate issues that keep me up all night, I’m rattling when I walk.

​I take 7 or 8 pills a day. I think. Honestly, I only remember to refill them when the bottle and the box are both bone-dry. Then it takes me two weeks to actually go get them because... well, refer back to the ADD section. I could do mail-order, but that involves the "Agony of Sal." If Sal gets to the mailbox first and sees a pill bottle, he’ll probably try to "have my back" by testing them for me.

​The Health Insurance Horror Show

​Getting medical insurance when you’re a freelance delivery driver and a chronic procrastinator is like trying to nail Jell-O to a wall.

​Last year, the state deemed me eligible for free medical, dental, and vision. I was thrilled! I ran to Urgent Care for my hip, got my X-rays, and found out I’m a prime candidate for a hip replacement. But before I could even talk to a specialist, the state yanked the rug out.

​Insurance: Cancelled. Why? Because apparently, they sent one notice in the mail asking for proof of income, and I missed it. Was it Sal hiding the mail? Was it the State being incompetent? Or was it my ADD turning the envelope into a coaster? Who knows! Now, a year later, I have 60 days to prove I’m poor enough to deserve a new hip. They won’t take bank statements; they want taxes. So now I’m in a dead heat to get my taxes done just so I can walk without a cane.

​WHAT THE FIASCO!

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The Zoo Keepers, The Slackers, and The Dead: Meet the Men of the Fiasco House

 

​Welcome to the ultimate reality show: My house. We're an eclectic community of 20 Older Men, living together in what the city euphemistically calls "Affordable Senior Housing." If you were casting a show called The Last Stand of the Slightly Grumpy, this would be your setting.

​Some of us are trying to enjoy retirement (I assume), others are still grinding away, and a few are hanging onto public assistance by the skin of their teeth, praying the landlord doesn't remember their last name. It's high-stakes senior living with a daily dose of high-octane drama.

​🚗 The Great Transportation Gauntlet (or, Why I Charge Tolls)

​If you still have working wheels—even just a slightly deflated bicycle—your options in this world are vast. But for those facing mobility issues? Their life is a costly, inconvenient slog. It's all expensive Ubers (which, let's be honest, they shouldn't be spending their fixed income on) or the begrudged generosity of neighbors.

​I can't even count the number of free rides I've given—and I regret every single one. Especially the one time I drove Davy. The car still smells like a forgotten attic and a stale pack of Chesterfields. I swear I saw the paint peeling off the interior.

​🛋️ The House Heroes and Homebodies (The Unstoppable Force of Laziness)

​Big Earl (The Cable King): Complains about his bad back 24/7, which is a shocker, as his job consists entirely of guarding the remote control. No wonder he needs senior grocery delivery; the journey from the couch to the fridge is his Mount Everest.

​Davy (The Social Worker's Best Friend): Our champion homebody. His personal hygiene is so legendary, only brand-new Uber drivers will risk picking him up. Word is, if his Social Security check dried up, he'd be the guy playing guitar in the subway tunnel. (The betting pool is currently open.)

​Lenny (The Biking Gourmet): Our local hardware store lackey. Lenny commutes on a bike—a fact that is instantly undone when he gets home and settles in with a six-pack for dinner. With his two surviving teeth, he’s in desperate need of a senior dental plan (or a heavy-duty food processor).

​🩺 Health Scares and Scars (The Fiascos That Get You Hospital Food)

​Carter (The Scooter Commuter): Gets everywhere on his electric scooter, blazing past the two guys who are still brave enough to take the main stairs (a FIASCO waiting to happen). His chest scar from open-heart surgery is a terrifying badge of honor—at least it finally scared him into quitting the smokes.

​Tommy (The Mumbling Mystery): Post-stroke and constantly deciphering anything Tommy says is a high-level diplomatic mission. If it weren't for Dick driving his sorry butt around, his elderly care situation would be the next Netflix true crime docuseries.

​Sal (The Hip-Breaker): His legendary, late-night fall (a broken hip, naturally) was the most exciting thing to happen here since the last time the fire alarm went off. He came back from rehab a 30-pound lighter shell of a man (zero smoking or drinking allowed—the inhumanity!). Now hobbling with a cane (or sometimes a broom handle), he still manages to orchestrate weekly cigarette and beer runs. A true survivor—and a true pain.

​In total, 25% of us require some sort of walking aid. And yes, a week after I moved in, some poor soul died in his sleep. I could go on, and on, and on, but if you’re anything like me, your Attention Deficit Disorder is screaming that this post is getting criminally long-winded.

​So, let's grab a coffee.  I'll continue this incredible story next time... after I find where I set my keys.

​TO BE CONTINUED......

​WTF: WHAT THE FIASCO

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Why I Write This (And Why You Must Read It)

Welcome, friends, to the WTF: What The Fiasco blog. If you’ve made it this far, congratulations! You’ve successfully navigated my impulsive design choices and my generally abrasive tone—two key symptoms of the A.D.D. brain that runs this operation.

The, blog is a collection of short, slightly fictionalized stories about my life as a 60+-year-old man who, thanks to my perpetually scattered brain, has found myself sharing a decaying Victorian house with 20 other emotionally stunted gentlemen. Yes, the stories are based on real life events, but the names, places, and specific levels of squalor have been strategically altered. Why? Because after decades of impulsively venting, I’ve finally learned to write it all down and edit it before shooting my mouth off and getting myself permanently evicted. 

You're seeing my life as it is now. The prequel—the long, twisted road that led me from a seemingly normal life to a life where I’m sharing a bathroom with a man who thinks gloves are optional in a gas zone—is a story for another time.

Do you want the prequel? Do you want the full, tragicomic history of this Fiasco? I’ll only write it if I see there’s genuine interest. So here’s the deal, and this is important:

• Read the posts. All of them.

• Leave comments. Tell me what you think. Tell me who your favorite weirdo is.

• Pass it on. Share this blog with anyone who has ever owned a pair of noise-canceling headphones.

If you don't do this, I will immediately assume one of two things: You are either too distracted by your own A.D.D. (in which case, I empathize), or you are actively avoiding dealing with me, just like everyone else in my life.

And honestly, both of those outcomes are just another chapter in the Fiasco.

Thanks for reading!

WHAT THE FIASCO!

🛒 The Day My Impulse Button Fired: Fired, Fired, and Fired

 

For most of my life, I toiled in the majestic arena of retail. Before I landed here in the WTF: What The Fiasco headquarters following the end of my 30-year marriage, I was a glamorous sales merchandiser for a major food manufacturer. It wasn't a bad gig: I got to travel to over 50 different stores, each one a unique ecosystem of baffling management and baffling customers. Fifty stores, fifty bosses—because every single store manager expected me to dedicate my life to their two hours a week of service, instantly ignoring the 49 other stores I serviced and the one actual boss I answered to. Needless to say, the relationship between vendor and manager was less a partnership and more a simmering, mutual hatred.

I’d clocked decades of wear and tear, accumulating a delightful collection of back and knee pains. But thanks to my trusty A.D.D., if a problem isn't loudly screaming in my face, it can wait indefinitely!  So, I worked through the pain, prioritizing tasks like making sure the chips were stacked just right, and ignoring the structural decay in my joints.

The Backroom Brawl

My actual boss was no help; he lived by the ancient, insane creed that the customer is always right, even when they are demonstrably, undeniably wrong. This setup was a constant trigger for my impulsive, short-tempered personality.

The final, glorious straw snapped one day as I was trying to haul merchandise through a particularly messy backroom. The scene was less a functional stock area and more a crowded nightclub filled with department managers and associates doing absolutely nothing but chatting. My frustration boiled over. Words were exchanged (loudly, impulsively, regretfully). Before I could even finish my outburst, the store manager—a man whose patience was clearly rated lower than the structural integrity of this Victorian house—threw me out.

The Impulsive Abyss

Normally, my boss would simply transfer me to a different store. But my Attention Deficit Disorder decided to check out. Having dealt with this exact flavor of petty annoyance for the thousandth time, I just snapped. I walked out and quit my job. Without thinking! The fact that I was already on A.D.D. and anti-depression meds, and I might have missed my morning dose, probably amplified the explosion. This wasn't just impulsive; this was the final, nuclear-grade straw.

At the time, I foolishly thought, Eh, I have enough cash until the next gig. I didn't care about unemployment. What I absolutely failed to consider were my benefits, specifically my precious Medical Insurance.

What I didn't also realize until it was too late was I was 60 years old, and the retail world was no longer interested in hiring me. So, here I am, self-employed as an independent personal shopper (Instacart, Shipt, the works)—a true digital-age Fiasco.

WTF: The Health Crisis

Now, the real terror begins. I'm too young for Medicare, but old enough that I’m one sneeze away from a catastrophic medical bill. Do I have to take early Social Security just to cover a decent health plan? Do I qualify for the dreaded Medicaid bureaucracy? What the Fiasco!

Remember me saying, "I have had my share of back and knee pains... With my A.D.D., if it's not in my face important it can wait."

WELL, IT'S IN MY FACE NOW!

It's in my neck, my knees, my back, and my hips! I didn't just go over the hill at age 60; I fell off the cliff that was hiding over that hill, without a net or medical insurance! At 63, my body is officially staging a coup.

WTF: WHAT THE FIASCO!

Next week, we'll dive into the ailments going around this house and my misadventures in trying to get and afford health insurance before time runs out—the ultimate Fiasco.

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The Fiasco of Flushing The Toilet

 The Fiasco of Flushing The Toilet

I was listening to the radio this morning, you know the usual nonsense, when I heard a story about a solid gold toilet expected to fetch $10 million at auction. Naturally, my mind went straight to the Victorian disaster I call home. I had a quick moment of capitalistic fantasy: if I framed one of our worn-out, stained toilet seats, could I auction it off for enough to, I don’t know, cover the cost of a replacement seat?

Because when you talk about Bathroom Etiquette in this house, you’re talking about a void. No one, and I mean no one, cleans up after themselves. Thank the gods (and the landlord's budget) for the weekly cleaning crew, but even they only do the bare minimum. You can sense their resignation—this is absolutely not where they want to be.

When I moved in, the shower was less a place of hygiene and more a petri dish of evolutionary biology. The shower curtains were practically a solid, moldy textile. I started slowly scrubbing the place down, and I swear, every single tenant looked at me like I was the lunatic. But if I have to use it, it has to, at the very least, meet my tragically low standards. I even supplied a pump hand soap from the dollar store. Everyone used it, of course, but instead of replacing it when it ran out, they just kept adding water in a pathetic, transparent attempt to create more soap.

Then there's the delightful Downstairs Kitchen Bathroom. Try cooking your dinner while some old man is on the other side of the paper-thin door, grunting, groaning, and farting like a wounded boar. It adds a certain je ne sais quoi to the cooking experience. This is especially fun when Big Earl is using it, which means everyone else just has to wait until the ex-Marine has completed his mission. Sharing space is for civilized people, not Big Earl.

One time, the bathroom door had been shut and locked for a suspiciously long time. I knocked, no answer. My immediate thoughts were, "Either someone locked the door and walked away, or someone is dead." After waiting a dignified 20 minutes, I knocked harder. BOOM! BOOM! BOOM! Suddenly, a massive thump came from the inside! I snapped, screaming at the door, “ANSWER THE DOOR, ASSHOLE! I THOUGHT YOU WERE DEAD!”

Another night, I woke up, stumbled to the toilet, and found a truly magnificent, unflushed payload. That wasn't the worst part. The worst part was that there was NO TOILET PAPER! WTF!

The structural integrity of this house’s waste system is also a masterpiece of failure. Sometime before I moved in, the cesspool was supposedly replaced. But we still have problems. From time to time, we get bubbling sewage erupting from the vent pipe in the yard. They send someone to snake the pipes, but no one ever cleans up the resulting deposit. As a result, the patch around that cleanout pipe is now the most highly fertilized spot in the entire yard.

Recently, our groundskeeper, Raul, left a large weed growing right on top of the sewer vent during his monthly yard work. Turns out, some idiot must have flushed a tomato (or just tomato seeds) down the drain. We now have a thriving tomato vine growing directly out of the effluence that bubbled out of the pipe.

Anyone want some shitty tomatoes?

Sometimes, I dream of winning the lottery and moving into a house with a working, private toilet. Then I wake up.

WTF: WHAT THE FIASCO!

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​☕ The Mini-Fridge, The Milk Leak, and The Cookoos Nest

 

After a few weeks, I began the process of settling into my new room. I’d met most of the inhabitants, though matching a name to a face remains a work in progress (unless that name is Sal, Big Earl, or Davy, of course).

​The very first lesson I learned in this hallowed institution: bring your own toilet paper, soap, and towel—and guard them with your life. Forget any one item, and it magically achieves escape velocity. I’m sixty years old, yet I was forced to buy a shower caddy to lug my necessary supplies to and from the shower every morning. I didn’t have to do this when I lived in college dorms as a teenager, but here, in the retirement phase of my life, it’s truly every man for himself.

​I set up my room to make it feel like home, which apparently makes me a revolutionary. When I put up real shades and curtains, the other guys were stunned. Most rooms in this building rely on a pathetic pillowcase pinned up over the window for privacy. I put up pictures and even installed an old kitchen clock to tell time. These guys were amazed. Some, like Davy, don't even bother with sheets on their beds. And Harold sleeps on a camping mat on the floor because, he claims, a bed "didn’t fit" in his room. I guess that explains the permanent cold he has.

​I’m currently running a dry sink against the front wall—my TV is on top, silverware is in the drawer, and all my pots, pans, and storage dishes are tucked underneath. Cooking here is an expedition: I have to drag everything I need either down the hall to the Downstairs Kitchen, or up the stairs to the large, less-used kitchen. Since Big Earl seems to cook 24/7, I opt for the uphill journey. On the bright side, the upstairs kitchen has more counter space. I quickly became a connoisseur of paper plates and coffee cups to minimize dishwashing, buying sleeves of cheap 12-ounce cups from the restaurant supply place for a fraction of the supermarket price. This is my life now: strategic paper product sourcing.

​I live by the philosophy of buying everyday items on sale and storing them anywhere I can, whether that's under the bed or in carefully stacked towers in the corner.

​Now, for the fridge drama. The main kitchen downstairs has one refrigerator, and there’s a second one conveniently located just outside my room. I noticed the main one was stuffed like a Thanksgiving turkey, and the second one was nearly empty. Naturally, I used the empty one.

​One by one, the other residents warned me: "That’s Big Earl’s refrigerator. Nobody else dares use it." I reminded them that the landlord said it was communal. So, I kept my food limited to half of one shelf, meticulously avoiding any territorial dispute with Earl’s massive tubs of leftovers.

​Then, the inevitable occurred. I came home from work, and Big Earl was waiting. Because I was trying to optimize space, I had laid a carton of milk on its side. Now, someone needs to explain the physics here: you can lay a bucket of paint or a can of soup on its side, and it's fine. But milk? Milk will always leak.

​Earl was furious. He made me clean out the refrigerator immediately!

​By the end of that week, I marched out and bought my own mini-fridge. I know if the landlord ever finds out about unauthorized appliances, my rent will probably shoot up, but so far, silence. I didn't enjoy having to kneel on the floor to get things out, so I grabbed some scrap wood from a neighbor's garbage and built a small table to elevate the fridge eighteen inches. Sal was utterly amazed, praising my handiwork for days.

​Sometimes, when I'm dealing with the absurdities of this cookoos nest, I wonder: If I'm the scatterbrain with A.D.D., then how do you explain everyone else living here? God, I need a cup of coffee!

​WTF: WHAT THE FIASCO!

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The Origin Story: How I Became a Fiasco

ADD A WTF MOMENT

​You go through life assuming your default setting is, well, normal. You figure being grumpy, scatter-brained, and one impulsive decision away from disaster is just... "who you are." You think, "I'm 35, overweight, and I can't find my keys, but hey, at least I’m authentic!" Then, one night, the universe steps in and throws a lamp at your head.

​For me, the thunderbolt of self-awareness arrived roughly 30 years ago, via an episode of Barbara Walters’ 20/20. I urge you, if you have access to the archives of confusing evening news television, look it up. It featured a guy my age, mid-thirties, who was essentially my personality twin:

​Grumpy: Check.

​Short-tempered: Double check.

​Impulsive: My middle name.

​Overweight: The universe gives you what you need.

​Day Dreamer: Currently mapping out a fully organized pantry in my head.

​Below-average student: Why study when you can daydream?

​Unorganized: My filing system is called "The Pile."

​The punchline? The guy was diagnosed with Attention Deficit Disorder (A.D.D.)—as an adult. I stared at the screen, jaw hanging, and screamed, “THAT’S ME! I’M NOT JUST A LUNATIC, I HAVE A REASON!”

​Naturally, my family reacted by doing what they do best: confirming I was a lunatic and ignoring me.

​I bring this up now, not for a pity party, but so you understand the underlying structural integrity (or lack thereof) of the mind that brought you here. The reason my life—and by extension, my living situation—escalated into a permanent state of What The Fiasco is rooted right here.

​A.D.D. is slightly different from A.D.H.D. I don’t jump noticeably up and down (I’m too tired for that); I just have the same scattered hard drive. It’s not a "child's disease," it’s a lifelong feature. Some people manage it by self-medicating—you know them as the guys chugging energy drinks, chain-smoking, or turning to... less legal remedies to quiet the noise. 

Others, like me for a long time, just pretend their chaos is a personality quirk. Billy Joel even wrote a soundtrack for it—that song about the "Angry Young Man" wasn't just catchy, it was autobiographical for half the population.

​If it seems like I’m constantly changing the subject, interrupting myself mid-sentence, or just generally making you feel seasick with my jumpy focus, well, there's your answer! That's my A.D.D. hitting the send button before the thought is complete.

Donald Trump is a classic example!   Hmm, did I say that?

​I’d love to elaborate, but as you know, that would derail the entire theme of the blog. Maybe when I run out of new fiascos involving Sal’s mail and Davy’s stench, I’ll write the prequel about my life before the age of 60.

​WHAT THE FIASCO!

Oh yeah by the way did I mention my name?  I'm Alan!

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The Party Patrol (Tom & Dick) and The Sarcastic Colossus (Harold)

Meet the house's official Misfit Troublemakers: Tom and Dick. These two operate as a single, loud, slightly hazardous unit, united by their intense commitment to partying and their general disregard for the concept of "rules."

Tom, a retired 70-year-old steel worker, looks like a guy who should be quietly rocking on a porch, but he prefers anarchy. He had a stroke sometime before I moved in, and while he's physically functional, his speech has been reduced to a dense, indecipherable mumble. Talking to Tom is like trying to decipher an important message that was translated twice through Google Translate before being recorded onto a rusty cassette tape.

Dick, the younger of the pair, is an out-of-work painter/carpenter who owns a van that may or may not be street legal—it’s perpetually under "contention" whether it’s registered, insured, or powered by sheer, stubborn delinquency. What truly sealed this unholy alliance was their connection to Lenny and a shared, profound appreciation for the "partying lifestyle."

The Quiet Hour Fiasco

Almost year-round, these two would stake out a spot on the side of the house, setting up a homemade barbecue that, when the weather dipped, instantly transformed into a roaring, dangerous fire pit. The house rule is quiet after 10 PM. Most of us follow it—if only to avoid a lecture from Big Earl—but Tom and Dick treat the rule like a suggestion written in invisible ink. They’d be roaring outside my window, or carrying the racket into Tom's room right next to mine.

These nights inevitably led to a scuffle with the landlord's enforcer (Big Earl's official title), and naturally, the neighbors on the block regularly called the actual police to complain. The local police know them well, mostly from scooping them up after bar fights or for being loudly, gloriously drunk in public. They are a fixture of municipal mayhem.

---

Harold: The Six-Foot-Five Brainiac

Then there is Harold. Harold defies physics by living in the absolute smallest room of the house, yet he pays the same monthly rent as the rest of us. The man is a towering, sarcastic colossus at 6'5" and over 200 pounds, built like a retired refrigerator.

His look is unique: a distinct horseshoe-pattern bald spot surrounded by hair that generally points straight up, and pants that appear to have shrunk four inches in the wash, perpetually preparing him for a flood.

Harold is a retired veteran living on Social Security and a tiny pension. He is one of the few here capable of throwing on a backpack and successfully completing the mile-long Slog of Agony into town on foot. He fancies himself an intellectual—he reads constantly and clearly believes this somehow makes him smarter and better than the rest of the riff-raff he shares walls with.

This intellectual superiority often expresses itself in dark, cutting sarcasm, which doesn't exactly make him popular, though bless his heart, he tries to socialize.

Despite his enormous stature, Harold survives almost entirely on canned goods sourced from local food pantries. His tech situation is a classic "Fiasco" compromise: he has a Smart TV, but only the crappy local HD internet feed he scavenged off the community share table (the one that only gets 4–6 channels). However, he had the foresight to grab a second-hand DVD player. This tiny piece of tech genius allows him to rent videos from the town library and escape the house's perpetual chaos through classic cinema.

WTF: WHAT THE FIASCO!

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