But somehow (The wall clock we bought with our wedding money at Target, the old-timey one that had the cracked face from when we moved, that is now missing a fat shard from laying on its face the last time I took it down for the batteries and (by not saying what for, I have) (and not one of the three white-plastic-thick-around-the-face clocks we got at the wedding (which we thought might have been part of an elaborate joke, given who the three people were who gave them to us (including Jordan, to whom (and Ellie) we gave white towels and a sappy card as a subtle joke at their wedding( but maybe too subtle (since they didn't get the joke))) but we later came to believe we must have registered for them, and then returned two of them, and one lives behind the blinds in the window over the sink by the canned air ("Danger: Do not open." it says.) Paris)) there's a ring (why, I don't know (or how)) on the wall where it's since we moved here. So I find myself in the absurd position of glancing at a faint circle and a nail when I want the time.
Therefore, I have no idea what time it is when I'm first writing this with one of the Bic ballpoint pens Jill bought when we ran out of pens (instead of the gel ink pens I thought she'd would buy (that's married people communication for ya)(I like the gel ones better)) on a sheet of printer paper which on the package is labeled "copy machine paper" (but when you get it for free (or, let's be honest, even when you pay for it) can you tell the difference?) using the back of a large black dictionary (not the magic dictionary, which is brown, and my friend Dan used to use for divination ("What should I do with my life" Opens it, points to an entry: "go away" in the phrase section) back in the days when our Ten Percent Society (the society we founded because we still believed in chivalry and muses) had names and faces) as a writing surface here on the arm of the couch.
I can't tell if I'm writing in it (I suspect not), but I can hear Stephen King's voice in my head. And although to most people this means something entirely different, to me it is a lucid voice, unafraid to say things that, although quite terribly true, need to be said. I have just finished reading the last 2/5 or so of Lisey's Story, up from a cool skin, soft sheets bed where I laid for an itself indeterminable amount of time, eyes happyclosed, but not sleeping (even though yesterday was spread thin like finals week and I nearly dozed several times at work, and oh yes, my excellent good friends, I went to bed early).
I suspect it is the caffeine, although my last hit was in that sweet spot, 2-3 in the afternoon, when your circadian rythyms are least affected. As I said, I'm using again, 90 mg at a time, 2-3 times a day. I once read that 100 mg in a setting is what it takes to get you high, and according to a study I read that's also the level at which chemical dependence starts. And 30 mg is enough for mood changes. But I've talked plenty about caffeine before. Moving on.
(I've reached the point in my job where I don't care enough some days to get enough sleep the night before. So I'm tired enough that I, as Dan puts it, give people "the sass." Which means that I, as I put it, am needlessly short with people and spontaneously annoyed with minor setbacks in people listening to me and following directions. Also, people being at all non-self-sufficient. In other words, combine not caring enough to go to bed early with not caring about the job, and I get rude. Dan says it's surreal to hear me being that way with people. And I agree. So, many days, it's the caffeine that keeps me civil.
Jill asks how my day went and I can only talk about what I am doing besides my job. Partially because there are only so many days you can complain about willfully ignorant rich people ("OK, double-click on that." "Double left click?"), and partially because I'm not at all proud of being unable to be kind to them ("That's the way it's usually done." "Well I'm not very computer savvy, so you'll have to be patient with me." (Is there any time in navigating a web page one must double-right-click? In Windows even? I'm only being so specific because you've needed such excessive hand holding thus far.)).
So I don't know if I should stick it out and learn to be the proverbial best ditch digger I can be, or jump ship so old ladies dipping their toes in the eastern seaboard real estate market can get technical support from someone else, someone under or over the fabled 18 month lifespan hump of a technical support I'm running up against, and not getting over.)
I read the that last 2/5 of Lisey's Story (which, as you might expect) tells its story in nested flashbacks), partially becuase the story was calling me from bed (along with Fantastic Contraption (which I played all day (you know how videos games are at the end of a day of playing them))), and also partially because although I could not sleep (tired though I was) my eyes did not feel like the light of a computer monitor (my oftentimes activity when this late night unsleeping happens (always in seasons when I'm on caffeine, ('strue)). I was afraid to bother Jill, but I turned on the lights, anyway, expecting her to complain if they did, corner floor, pillar table, curled up on the couch and got on with my better addiction. Not until I'd finished it, and the paragraph before the paragraph before this one, did my eyes feel like getting back to bed. So I did (after taking some pictures for the blog (not my favorite set I've taken)).
) I'm quite awake and doing well today at work, though, thanks. (I've even been nice.)
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