At my age, I'll settle for hard water.

Get on the National DoNotCall list...it kinda works.

I see a gigantic skull near the peak, left of center....

I read somewhere that there is a tribe in Africa that maintains there are two deaths a person undergoes; first is the physical death, followed by the death of everyone who ever knew the deceased. When that last person who actually knew them dies, they have had their inevitable second death. I find that concept rather comforting, somehow. A well known historical figure may have volumes written about them, but that is not firsthand experience; it is only the recollections of a third party, shaded by their perceptions, biases, and prejudices.

I'm a seasoned citizen, and I can tell you that it's very difficult to track with a conversation if the other person is a fast talker. I couldn't hold a convo with Ben Shapiro if my life depended on it! I've been known to interject, "Hold on a damned minute, I can't listen as fast as you're talking!" Slow down, enunciate carefully, maybe even kick up the volume slightly. At the start of a convo it's like my brain needs a couple seconds to get itself properly focused, so I'm playing catch up from the jump! My wife has a behavior that messes me up- at the end of whatever she is saying, her volume drops intil it becomes unintelligible, and I have to ask her to repeat, which becomes frustrating for her. I also have tinitus in a major way, and that doesn't help either.

Absolutely true! Who's to say you won't have a future conflict with that 'friend', and they then use your secrets as ammunition to hurt you by spreading them to listening ears. The old saying 'Two people can keep a secret, as long as one of them is dead" is a truism, and for good reason.