What the hell?

(written 11pm Sunday)

There’s nothing like a little bit of insomnia to drive someone nuts.
Particularly someone who knows they need to be well rested the following
day.

Good god, I’m wide awake. After spending a night painting the streets of
Queens red, I woke today to pull weeds in the backyard. Lasting only a
few hours, I’m convinced I sweated the booze entirely out of my system.
Initially planning to solely bag leaves, Flora and I attempted to dig up
the grassy plants that border one side of our fence. Picture the two of
us on our hands and knees, gloves donned, with dirt flying by as we
strained our pathetic urban appendages about.

After an hour (or two) of making ourselves dirtier than Adam or Eve
could have every possibly been, we caved. Out came the anvil clipper.
Down went the grass. Then came the bagging process. Double bagging was
deemed necessary. And so was a trip to the corner diner and grocery
store. Instead of being fiscally prudent, I bought a cheeseburger
deluxe, sour cream and cheddar potato chips, and chocolate chip cookies.
(3 of which equal 160 calories and 61 grams of fat. Or maybe it was 31.
Regardless, I ate at least four times the daily allowance based on the
packaging…but they really hit the spot. Atkins does not exist on
weekends. Sorry.)

And then it was five. The ‘good’ thesis student called and I was happy
to hear how much of her paper is complete. Come next Monday, all of it
will be mine to read for the next two weeks. Joy. (But not in a bad way.
I’m excited to read it, but I have to wrap up class first….and I suspect
the fourth of july is going to wreck havoc with schedules at work.)

Crawling up the stairs I scrubbed until it hurt. Cleaner than a whistle
I had planned to nap…but of course the phone kept ringing. Blah. Ugh.
And now I’m paying for it. Actually, I’ll pay for it tomorrow morning
when I’m exhausted after rousing myself from a foggy slumber.

I am attempting to self-medicate with yellow tail. Awful, I know. I am
at a loss as to why my insurance has yet to kick in. (Two unrelated
items. In lieu of Nyquil, I’m substituting the grape. Separately, I have
yet to see any deductions in my paycheck for access to the medical
community.)

Another thing I *must* follow up with… transport for the last weekend of
June. We can either rent a van ($60/hr) or a limo ($50-60)/hr. You can
put 6 people in a 6 person limo – but it’s tight. (Or so they tell me.)
If it’s ok with you (as though the wine tasters would be reading this),
I might ask my pop to drive us about if I can snag a van to rent. Then
it wouldn’t matter what time we started/ended. Except that we’d need to
be back by Ronkonkoma/Holtsville before dark. If the pool dudes come
next weekend (and the weather cooperates) that could allow for some
swimming that eve. Hmm…must communicate this when I have a spare moment
to think tomorrow.

My 10 was cancelled, thank goodness. But I have an 11 that I’m not ready
for as I’ll need to update a dbase and a presentation with the comments
that were hopefully emailed to me over the weekend. If they’re not
sitting in my in-box that means I’ll have to decipher someone’s
handwriting. On top of that, I’m slightly nauseous over the information
we collected Thursday. Somehow everyone else is busy, and I’m magically
supposed to update a handful of specs…which are really written in code
as far as I’m concerned. 1) accounting was not my forte in college 2) I
am not an excel guru and the thought of combing through spreadsheets and
correcting formulas..well, sucks. Oh! And lest I forget, I need to come
up with a timeline implication document by Wednesday. All of this means
squat to you, but is the root of me not being able to sleep tonight.

I forgot my corny joke from earlier today. When I finally pulled a four
foot weed root out of the ground, I stood up and said,” Could this be
considered the root of all evil?”

Pregnant pause.

I’m sorry, really I am.

Great. Here’s something to nuggle my thoughts against as I trudge
upstairs. The three (not one, not two) firetrucks that are on my street.
Apparently there’s an ‘incident’ four houses down that requires sirens,
lights, and men to run around with oxygen tanks and axes.

Sleep tight.

Don’t let the bed bugs bite.

p.s.
Taken from the back cover of Michael Moore’s book,” Downsize this!”:

“The United State of America” is too long; it’s drab and ultimately,
it’s just a description. Look at the British. They called their country
“Great Britain” and look how far that got them, considering there’s
nothing really “great” about them. I say we change our name to “The Big
One.” That says it all. “Where and I from? I’m from THE BIG ONE!”

sigh.

Don’t even get me started on how funny I found his suggestion of moving
DC to Tijuana. (If Georgie is convinced NAFTA will create jobs and cut
expenses, they should try some of their own medicine.)

I think I momentarily lost sight of my goals in landing a long-term
short-term spot: Balancing the negatives in my debt column, to fund a
year of study.

Anywhere.

Last night was fabulous, as was the experiment in drinking after work
with a colleague (even if I missed the signal it was more of a date.)
Life should be full of experiences, and not missed opportunity. Screw
the economy. (But yay! that my tank top from three years ago fits
again.)

Um, going upstairs to wrestle with my comforter this warm muggy night.

posted by irene @ 6/16/2003 08:57:00 PM