Martin likes to posture like he's hardened and doesn't give a shit about anything, but that's not true.

He confided in me when we first met up that he was afraid that I was setting him up regarding the restraining order. He was paranoid that perhaps I got a restraining order established without his knowledge, and then set up a "meeting" so I could call the police and get him arrested. Not only wouldn't I ever do that, but if I did, I could get in trouble for filing a false police report, as there would be a clear pattern of documentation on PFA (with witnesses) that I was voluntarily meeting with him.

I laughed and told him that I was meeting with him in good faith, and that I don't engage in snake-like trickery like that. This brought up discussion of the actual restraining order I attempted to file against him in 2021. We traded stories on it from both of our perspectives. On my side, it appeared he dodged service, no-showed, dodged service again, and then I no-showed to the second hearing, believing he hadn't been served. On his side, it appeared he got a letter to appear, never saw the temp restraining order application itself, never knew about the first hearing, never refused service, and showed up to the second hearing. I believed his account of the situation, and I think the county process server was lazy and lied about Marty "refusing service", when in reality he just wasn't home and the guy gave up both times. So I think he really didn't know about the first hearing, and I thought he wasn't showing for the second hearing, and both of us showed for those respective hearings, missing each other, and the case was dismissed. I told him all of that obviously wasn't necessary anymore, and I was glad we were past all that. It seemed he understood.

He asked to pose for a picture with me, and asked some random in the Horseshoe to take it. He was concerned that he would be trolled on the forum for being short while standing next to me, so I actually did him a favor and didn't stand up completely straight for the pic (lol).

He told me about his issue with cataracts. Apparently he drove 300+ miles from Oceanside to Vegas with almost no vision, and even worse did it at night. He's lucky he didn't kill himself or others. He had major cataracts, being essentially blind in one eye and almost blind in the other. No idea why he didn't see a doctor sooner, prior to it getting to this point. He told me he had just gone to an ophthalmologist in Vegas, and they literally took away his car keys after seeing how blind he was. They said they were required by law not to allow him to be able to drive after seeing how bad it was. He complained that the surgery was going to be something like $1200, which he said was going to eat most of his savings.

Again, I was surprised by this admission of almost being broke, given the home he had just shown himself supposedly renting just a few weeks earlier.

I told him that I had the very beginnings of cataracts in my right eye, and that perhaps I would be getting the exact same cataracts surgery at his age. (Martin is a little more than 7 years older than me.) My cataracts only are noticeable when a room abruptly goes from light to pitch dark, so this does not affect my driving, as outdoors never has such an abrupt light transition. However, both parents have had cataracts, so it's just a matter of time for me.


All in all, the meetup was pleasant, though I knew we were only one Beam relapse away from seeing the old Jewdonk emerge.

Continued next post...