You're Doing It Wrong

I’ve been doing tons of online research lately related to my new writing project and in addition to finding a lot of great information I’m also finding a lot to be annoyed about. What is this thing where the search engine links you to another search engine which is just a big fat commercial — sussing out what you want to *buy* based on your query? Does everything have to be about buying something?

Big Brother finally finished. It ended up with the two loathsome people in the finals but I had to see how it ended. Glad it’s over. Alias starts Sunday and I watched the first Brotherhood of Poland N.H. — not sure if I’ll stick with it. Too many things to remember to tape.

Life isn’t THAT hectic but I’m feeling unorganized (or would that be disorganized?) and spun out. I’m tired, too, and I got a good night’s sleep. I don’t know what the story is but I ate a lot of sugar and fatty crap yesterday so perhaps that’s a contributing factor.

Over the weekend I ordered this book I was looking for that I couldn’t get at the library and I found it super cheap – only $5. I didn’t want to do a whole book order for just $5 so I browsed their other books to see if there was anything remotely interesting and decided to buy a collection of Ring Lardner stories and a collection of Jack London stories. I remember being totally into Jack London as a kid and I haven’t read him since so I’m curious to revisit his writings. But back to the book order, this brought it up to a whopping $10. I put the order in and got a confirmation that the book I actually wanted was already sold but they were sending the $5 of books I tacked on just trying to make the order worthwhile. They did not respond to my request to cancel.

I saw the calendar yesterday and discovered it was the equinox. I knew summer was over but I didn’t realize it was official. Looks like the rest of the week will be great weather so I have high hopes for my tomato patch. I might get enough for a pasta sauce after all.

Another thing — my three month vacation from doing laundry is over. Bob is back in school. I did four loads this weekend and I’d like to know how ALL of his clothes manages to come out inside out.

I have a zillion scrawled notes here for blogging. I spent the entire weekend working on writing. I’m starting Cynthia’s class again tomorrow and I volunteered to go at the first class. I still hadn’t finished my last project — I just put it in the mail last week. I knew I could do it and I’ve been working on notes and mini-outlines for a couple of weeks. I finalized my outline yesterday morning and today I fixed up the first 13 pages I wrote last weekend and added another 12. A productive day. It seems 100x easier this time and I’m not sure if it’s an easier idea or I have more practice. Probably a combination of both. My first act is a little thin but I like having room to add more later.

I am a week behind on my New York Times magazine. I just read last week’s and there’s a recipe for grilled chocolate sandwiches. It sounded so unnecessary — I saved it. We’ll be trying that this winter.

Bob got Krakatoa: The Day the Earth Exploded. by Simon Winchester unabridged on tape from the library and I kind of groaned because I didn’t know how we’d get through it. I read the review of the book in the NYT and the review scared the crap out of me — I wanted to read the book. We listened to half of the tapes on the way home from Orleans. Over Labor Day we unexpectedly went to the coast for a wedding so we listened to most of the rest and I finished the last couple of tapes last week. It’s an amazing, terrifying story and well written. Winchester is coming to Portland this Fall and I don’t want to miss him.

My last topic is on clothing. I think I say this about every 6 months but I hate everything in my closet. I also hate buying clothes. I’d rather do other things with my money. If I have 4 outfits I have enough for each day of my work week and I can wear any junky outfit at home on the weekends and I do. And of the few clothes I buy, there are a few things that I never wear. Does everyone do this? Buy things they never wear? It’s so embarrassing.

On Wednesday night Bob went to a club to see some funkateer music guy, Bernie. He got home after 2am so he went and slept downstairs. (It’s also about 10 degrees cooler down there so it’s a much better choice.) Yesterday morning I went down to say “bye” before I left for work and he’s on the bed in this crossways, crunched up position because the bed is covered with cds. I started laughing and said, “sleeping with your cds?” and he was still mostly asleep and said, “yah.” I think we’re both going to sleep down there tonight since it’s going to be another hot one and Bob said he would clear the cds off the bed.

While I was sick I watched Searching for Debra Winger a documentary by Rosanna Arquette. We just watched our tape of Ebert & Roeper from the weekend and Roeper was reminding viewers that the documentary was going to be shown one more time.

The reason I bring this up is because Roeper’s take on the film was that it was about how Hollywood treats actresses over 40. And sure that was part of it. But what I thought it was about was how difficult it is for women to balance their creative and/or professional life with their domestic life. Interesting because this is not generally an issue for men. And no one had a solution — the answer was: it’s hard. Sure, women can have it all but at the sacrifice of something. A lot of the women with kids said they did only one film a year. Some of the older women said they felt guilty about not doing more for their kids because they were working. I suppose a third option would be to never sleep and spread yourself too thin and drag ass through your life.

I don’t have to worry about the mother piece — but I struggle with the balancing act myself. I constantly feel like I have to negotiate for extended time to focus on my writing projects. Like I’m fighting to assert that I need this time to get focused and concentrate on my work and I want to skip doing things I’d normally do. And I feel like often, when it comes time for someone to put down what he or she is doing and take care of shopping, or meals or some other chore, that that person is me.

It’s not like Bob is blind to all this or doesn’t care. He’s supportive. But I just wish it didn’t feel like a struggle sometimes.

When we were in Orleans, I finished Life of Pi which is a fantastic book by Yann Martel. I liked it so much while I was reading it I said, “You can’t even believe this is a book.” There is a lot of heavy stuff going on that I didn’t get and I’m going to have to read it again. I looked online to see if there was anything like this extensive analysis of Mulholland Drive (movie) but no luck.

The bummer about this bug I have is its endless lingering. I’m coughing and blowing my nose and not feeling all that much better than when I got home on Tuesday afternoon. I’m not hungry. All I’ve eaten is fruit and chicken broth with vegetables. And I’m having a terrible time sleeping. I’m tired but I don’t fall asleep. Fistfuls of homeopathic sleep-aids don’t help. Last night I kept getting up to read but as soon as I read a page or two my eyes would begin to slide shut so I’d put the light out and then lay there. Same thing happens when I try to nap. I’m feeling pretty run down. So much for a weekend of yardwork and errands.

Tonight we’re going to see Nickelcreek. I’m going to guzzle a power drink and hope for the best. I figure since it’s them at least it won’t go on until some unspeakable hour.