i don't have much to say, but i sure said a lot.

i thought i had something to say today. seems like i should. i have decided that i don't, but still feel compelled to at least say this.

i have wondered, as i do periodically, at my polarity. not in a DSM-IV sense. but that i can be such a gentle spirit so much of the time, and yet have such psychically violent tendencies. particularly as they relate to other people not doing what i think they should be doing or doing what i don't think they should be doing or doing things wrong. how can i be so floaty and such a control freak all at the same time? so "live and let live" but so irritable? or is it 'ible?

these are things i do not know. i want to just eat a bunch of donuts and forget to have conversations with myself. i do know that.

i think the universe needles at me, much the way my sisters do. i think the universe is a real jokey jokester. take my sensitivity to sound:

i lack the ability to filter out peevish sounds. snorting. chewing. mouth breathing. gum chomping. slurping. gurgly catches in throats. coughing. throat clearing. faucets leaking. feet shuffling. bowl clinking. yogurt cup scraping. radio garbling. microphone bumping. and when i say these things bother me, please let me clarify: i have to leave the room. my head feels like it will explode, and i get anxious. and inexplicably angry. i hear lots of people say, "oh, what an annoying sound!" as they pleasantly carry out their business. dear friends, this is not what i am saying. i am saying that as long as the peevish sound continues, i will not be able to concentrate on one single other thing, to the point that i will actually appear clinically insane in the membrane and will probably have a lot of apologizing to do later. (incidentally, the place where i work is very noisy. i spend a large part of my day trying not to appear insane. gum smackers. sinus problem snorters. candy crunchers. i work in my own private mine field of sounds.)

i am sure this nudges me up the autism spectrum. (you know we're all on it, right? just in varying degrees.)

i do not like a lot of grunting at the gym. audible exhaling is fine. i hiss a bit when I'm really exerting myself. but there are 2 "orgasmic grunters" in the 5 a.m. crowd. one is a short, stout, white lady with curly hair who wears knee wraps. i'll call her "Carol." the other is a short, super extraordinarily chiseled black man with a porn 'stache who wears head to toe spandex and walks on the balls of his feet. i'll call him "Lance." what these characters have in common is loud, orgasmic grunting with lots of vowels.

i was hissing through my abs on one side of the gym today when Lance settled in nearby and began to work very hard. His first set, I put one hand over an ear and said, "Oh my god. Dude!" The second set, traumatized, annoyed, disgusted, I grabbed my stuff and my mat and hurried to the other side of the gym where I repositioned myself and continued. Seconds later, Carol settled in next to me.

that is how i know the universe needles me. it surrounds me with orgasmic gym grunters.

sister blister

Today, I experienced the following character blips:

1. I spent too much time this morning at the gym trying to figure out if a woman's boobs were fake. Sister Blister, P! Sister Blister.

2. A woman was barfing in a 5th floor bathroom stall. Just me and the barfer. I should have asked her if she was okay and offered to bring her a glass of water.

Instead, I plugged my ears,

I peed, washed my hands very thoroughly, and then exited hastily, using my elbow to turn the door handle.

[Seriously, this is the 3rd time in 1.5 years that I have witnessed someone barfing in the 5th floor bathroom. I hold firm to my assertion that there is something in this building that makes people sick. Don't even get me started on the weird crap in the cafeteria food.]

3. I allowed the door to fall closed behind me, even though a woman was within door-holding range. She was moving too damn slow. Geez, Lady, pick up your feet.

I blame it on my narcissistic crazy gym nemesis. Last night my narcissistic crazy gym nemesis (Fountain Pony; not Are-Those-Boobs-Fake?-Lady) popped in my dream. I woke up really mad. I don't remember what she was doing in my dream; it was the fact that she was allowed to infiltrate my dream. Clearly, it shook a stick at my relatively good nature. I shake my fist at you, Narcissistic Crazy Gym Nemesis Fountain Pony Lady. No "Sister Blister" here. This lady is batshiz nutters.

colonization of p

we're getting a new coffee table today. we are very excited about this. unreasonably excited. it complements the new couch and chair and ottoman and end table delivered a few weeks ago. if we are unreasonably excited about the new coffee table, we were absolutely batshit crazy irrational about that couch and chair and ottoman and end table.

a few months ago, we replaced the dishwasher. i still get a little zing in my soul when i pour in soap and push the start buttons. so many buttons on this new model. it's obviously a very important machine.

new curtains. i have new curtains for the purple room. they're not up, yet. The hardware to hang them, i mean, has not been wall anchored and screwed and junk; but i have the curtains. sometimes i pull them out of the bag and touch them. i fantasize about what they will look like hanging over my grandmother's old laundry bench with the flashy pillows.

i'm really excited about making split pea soup tonight. i've never made split pea soup. i think i'm going to throw in some spinach and kale, and this makes my heart speed a bit.

don't even get me started about how frothy i am in anticipation of my teeth cleaning in february.

these are the things that excite me lately. i have been colonized and domesticated. this is an outrage. an OUTRAGE!

the hot dentist.

Sugar makes me intolerant. I've been eating entirely too much lately. Leaving work for the day, I pretended not to see a woman hustling toward the elevator. I let it close. I left her behind. Sorry, Lady. I was just really tired of people. It doesn't matter how much I like you, how cool you are, how attractive you may be; at some point, I'm just really so sick of you I could barf.

I'm intolerant of elevator conversation. "Boy, sure is cold out there!"

"Sure is."

"Boy, just look at all that snow!"

"Yep. I saw it."

"Boy!"

One day last week I had the elevator to myself when a man boarded on the 2nd floor. He stood in the corner. Seriously. It was just him and me, and he stood in the corner with his nose about 1 inch from the emergency buttons. It was pretty weird, but I liked that he was as uninterested in talking to me as I was to him. Too much pretending makes me tired.

And it's Tunnel Time. Underground tunnels (Is there such a thing as an above-ground tunnel?) connect the parking lots and all the buildings. When it's snowing and bitterly cold (Boy! Can you believe this cold?!) I hike the 3 blocks in the dank underbelly of Iowa's capitol. Some people use them all year long. I don't understand this. They bring their tennies and sweat pants and hike back and forth next to the leaky water pipes and strange murals (One mural has 3 black crows flying in such a pattern, with wings at such angles, that it looks like a witch flying on a broom.). I bet there are a lot of body parts cemented in those walls. That's not pleasant.

I'm having weird dreams again. Last night I was chasing a rodent and washing the word "Studwater" off a window. I like knowing when I've popped up in someone's dream. But, I've recently decided to stop telling others when they're in my dreams. Some people really get weirded out about that. I mean, seriously. I think that's ridiculous. I can't be held responsible for what my brain does when I'm sleeping. Just because you're in my dream doesn't mean I'm going to stalk you and leave dead stuff in your yard. I don't have a room in my house lined with sliced newsprint that spells out your name 35 million times.

Or do I? Sleep with one eye open.

I went to the dentist today. I am debating whether or not to publicly confess that I hadn't been to a dentist in well over 10 years. I guess I just resolved my debate. But look: I brush; I floss; I mouthwash; I don't drink pop or weird, sugary juice drinks; I don't eat a bunch of candy. Nothing hurts. Nothing is wiggly and falling out. So, I don't think about going. If it ain't broke…

I went to Chris's dentist. He calls her the "hot dentist." She's pretty, but I wouldn't say she's "hot." Maybe she's just not my type. I don't know. But I lost a filling a while back and let it go too long, and I might need a root canal. I figure root canals probably aren't really all that bad. It's probably just something people say--something that wormed its way into our scripts. Most of our scripts are dumb. So I'm optimistic.

One question on the intake form asked, "Do you plan to keep your teeth for the rest of your life?" Seriously? What kind of question is this? I circled NO.

The hot dentist poked at my gums and scraped at my teeth, and then she took off her mask and told me that other than the missing filling, I had a healthy mouth. She said that: "You have a healthy mouth." She looked disappointed--defeated--when she said it. "You've been really lucky to get away with not going to the dentist." Like I was cheating. Like I'd skipped class all semester and then aced the final. All that flossing and brushing and no-pop-drinking. You sneaky little sneak.

I scheduled a cleaning, too. Tonight I'm drinking red wine just to get a little more bang for my buck.

alyssa milano never wrote me back.

I've thought about writing a million times. And then I didn't, and now I don't remember what I had to say in the first place (So it probably wasn't important.). Thoughts are like that. They just float in and out; I bet 3/4 of them aren't even mine--just remnants of some universal thought bank, wafting, passing through our membranes like smoke through clothes. I wish we had a way to track that (cross-country thought traveling). I guess we do. I guess it's called stories and art and music and dance and stuff. You know, expressive stuff. Maybe that's why the arts are so important--they connect us--maybe more so than banking does.

Although, that's not fair to say. I once had a pretty interesting connection with a lady who worked at a bank. Many many years ago I lived alone in a tiny apartment on the ground floor of an old house. The Mormons came a-knocking: a young woman about my age, and her mother. There was something about the young woman that I instantly liked (I think it's pretty easy to tell if someone is bringing you light.); plus it really interests me how people develop such strong convictions. I mean, it doesn't really matter what you think about Mormons: knocking on people's doors uninvited because you feel like you have a very important thing to tell them is a pretty ballsy thing to do.

Wait. Not Mormons. She wasn't a Mormon. Mormons are young men in black slacks and white button-downs. She was… I don't remember. But there was a kid in elementary school in Kansas who was this, too, and he had red hair and wasn't allowed to participate in any Christmas stuff.

It doesn't matter. Balls.

So, this young woman, I said, "Sure, come on in." And we talked for a while, and I learned that she had really explored different faiths extensively--traveled, read, experienced--and arrived at these convictions thoughtfully. I was impressed by that. She asked if she could come back, and I said "Sure" to that, too. So, for several weeks, she would come over, usually just by herself after that, and we'd hang out and talk about God and her faith. It wasn't a debate. I didn't agree with her, and I wasn't going to convert, but I liked hearing her talk about it. I think we just both kind of enjoyed the shared time. Then she left for a year-long mission trip.

Anyway, all that to say she worked at a bank. So you can work at a bank and still connect with humanity in meaningful ways. Actually, one thing my mom always told me, which I understand more and more, is that it really doesn't matter what you do for a living--that you always always always have an opportunity to make a difference to someone. (Relatedly, my dad always says it doesn't matter what you do for a living as long as you do it well and with integrity: doctor, attorney, barista, garbage collector, cable man, pizza delivery dude… whatever) I think that's why it's important that no matter how you earn your paycheck, you should try really hard not be an asshole while you do it.

[I don't know where this crap comes from. Sometimes I sit down to write, and I have no idea what I want to say until it starts coming out, and then I think, "What? What's that doing in there?"]

My body feels gross. It needs to get back to the gym. It needs me to stop putting so much garbage in it. It needs me to cut back on the wine. Really, I've been drinking too much wine. It needs me to rein it in, for crying out loud. It needs several days of fruit and veggies and water. It needs me to not stop at Walgreens on the way home from Chrispy's gig at midnight because I have a sudden overpowering urge for Milanos.

Which reminds me that I once wrote a letter to Alyssa Milano asking for advice about becoming an actress, and she never wrote back.

Jehovah's Witness. That's it. Man, I'm glad we got that squared away.

mr. wednesday and the poop filled sock

I feel like writing, but I don't feel like connecting any of my thoughts. Poor you.

My workout this morning was pitiful. The only way it could have been any more pathetic was if I had curled up on a weight bench with a bucket of fried chicken and a pillow. But you know, I went and all that.

I've had a lot of delightful moments this week. I say "delightful moments" because they were relatively insignificant blips in the day that made me happy. The first was when I was stuck behind a school bus on the way to work. We stopped at an apartment complex, where a group of elementary school kids lined up to board. Then, other kids came running out of buildings. Right in the middle of a flashback to my own school bus days, the very last kid busted out of a door, half the coat on, half the coat flapping at her side, hair a mess, and papers popping out of her unzipped backpack. And then I thought, "Ah, yes. There I am." And then I laughed loudly in my car for at least another 5 blocks.

I've been painting this week. I've been painting instead of practicing guitar and trying to write songs for the COFFEE project. (I've decided to call it "resting" instead of "avoiding.") I am not a good painter by any stretch. I don't paint things that look like other things. I just like to play with colors and brushes and see what happens. Yesterday, Chris compared my painting to "a sock filled with poop." He will deny this. But here is exactly what happened:

Chris: [Stands above painting, which is lying flat and in-progress, on the kitchen table.] Huh. Is it finished? [He smirks.]

Patresa: [Laughs.] What, can't you tell?

Chris: [Laughs.] Sure. [He continues to stare at the painting.]

Patresa: Do you love it? Is it your favorite? I think you love it. I'm going to hang it from the ceiling above your side of the bed, face down. So, you can look at it every morning and every night.

Chris: Oh yeah? Well, I'll fill a sock with poop and put it on your side of the bed.

Incidentally, no, it isn't finished; and I have no idea what it is, but it might turn into a bird. Note: Chris is actually my biggest fan and super supportive. He is also very honest.

We got a new dishwasher this week. The delivery/installation guy called me to set up a time to deliver/install. He left a message. Listening to his message, I jotted down some notes:

TIM          WEDNESDAY
555-5555
DISHWASHER

Chris saw the note and said, "Who's Tim Wednesday?" No, he wants to come over Wednesday. That's not his name. But we referred to him as "Mr. Wednesday" for the remainder. Tim came over on Wednesday and installed the dishwasher. He handed me his business card before he left, and I had a moment of genuine confusion when the last name printed on the card was not "Wednesday."

In anticipation of Mr. Wednesday's arrival, I told Chris, "I hope he has a nice crack."

Chris replied, "Nobody has a nice crack." I thought that was quotable and true. Nobody has a nice crack. It's not a remotely sexy part of the body. Butts are weird.

I wish grocery store produce aisles would label the produce more clearly. I had a recipe for sauteed parsnips and turnips. Standing in front of the produce, I didn't know which was which, only that they were one and the other. So I took one of each and figured, well, they'll both go in the pan. Covered. But they didn't have stickers, and the cashier asked me what they were. I said, "I don't really know," which I'm sure she found strange.

pull it together, p

It's Pull It Together, P Day at my house. I'm not sure 1 day is enough, so thankfully tomorrow is Sunday. My shiz scatters to the 4 winds so easily, so regularly. I don't know where anything is. C is patient, but last night, while cursing everything solid as I hunted for lost things (things I needed in order to complete a project I should have finished at least 4 months ago), I realized my mess had kind of buried him, too. I don't understand exactly how my piles get so disorderly; they just do. I am some kind of human hurricane, bumbling bermuda triangle, two-legged typhoon. I am, from time-to-time, a natural disaster. At least I'm nice. And I make good cheesecake.

Surprisingly, I'm really good at setting up organizational systems. I even like doing it. I have color-coded files at work and a "directory" indicating what goes in each color. I don't actually put anything in those files, however. The intended contents are dog-earred and busting out of off-colored folders on my desk.

Yesterday I had lunch with Katie MacDaddy (who isn't "MacDaddy" anymore, but I can't let go), and we discussed our dual personalities -- that likely everyone has multiple personalities; it only becomes disorderly if they start talking with accents and making important life decisions. For instance, I house both an introvert and an extrovert. Sometimes my introvert wakes up and finds that the extrovert has abandoned our person in the middle of a party. That's bad news. Sometimes my anal retentive librarian takes over the wheel to discover that the Bohemian Baton Twirler has filled all the labeled accordion files with leaves and doodles during her shift.

I see a cobweb by the TV. Gross.

And so, today, on local (very local) Pull It Together, P Day I will dig through my crap and organize my crap, and find my lost crap, and throw out some old crap, and crap like that, so that C will not be tempted to go out and find himself a nice, tidy librarian.

pants.

I'm in Sioux City. I had raw onions on my salad tonight. Bad choice. I wish I'd brought a book; I feel mindless--like my brain is drooling on itself and short-wiring. I brought work, but I don't have the focus to do it. I don't work well in the evenings. Intellectual fatigue. At a certain point every day, I'm done, all finished, zeroed out. I get up at 4:30 a.m. to run around and lift things in repetitive patterns; I expire early. Is this age? I remember "all-nighters" when I was 20. I don't think I could pull an all-nighter if I tried. I would need invasive surgery to keep my eyes open that long.

I dressed badly today. Some days I'd like a redo. Relatedly, I lost a pair of pants. Not today. I don't know when I lost them--a couple of months ago, maybe. I also don't know how I lost them. I don't take my pants off in strange places, so where could they possibly be? I could see losing a pair of socks. But pants? No. Pants seem like something you'd keep track of.

This morning I was running late, and I pulled up to a red light behind another car. I was turning right. The car in front of me was not turning right. It was a long light, and I noticed how mad I was that the Toyota in front of me was not turning right. Who goes straight at red lights? Ridiculous. We could have been moving by then--right on red, let's go! Then, I thought, that's a pretty funny thing to be mad about. So I let it go. Then the light turned green, and the Toyota…. turned right.

starchy pellets

I'm hungry.
The house is a pit.
Bills are stacked.
I hate the tedium of paying them (stamps and envelopes and logging into accounts and looking up amounts and… gah, just shoot me right in the soul.)
And my guitar needs restringing.
(Because I busted my very first string, which made me feel kind of badass until I told C and he made fun of me for thinking that was badass.)
The printer has stopped communicating with my laptop again.
I don't know why these 2 fuss so much.
And I need to trim and install some fancy new insoles for my running shoes.
Because my back and knees hurt.
I don't know why they fuss so much, either.
The dishwasher is busted.
I've been eating horribly.
And my workout routine is all zoinked up.
My body is complaining (and getting mushy).
More travel this week.
And the week after.
And then that weekend.
And the weekend after that one.
And then it's Christmas.
I'll like that.
I love cookies and cider.
Also, my family is awesome.
C and I haven't seen much of each other since our vacation in October.
Last night we went to dinner.
It felt like a first date, like we needed to reintroduce ourselves and talk about the weather.
Until C started talking about music and music theory and how much he loves guitar.
I like it when C talks about music.
It wakes up his inner-mystic.
Inner-mystics are my favorites (My guess is we all have one. But we get embarrassed when they do the talking.).
I think if we let our inner-mystics steer our big dumb ships, we'd be happier.
We'd be weirder.
But we'd be happier.

I just listed a lot of complaints.
My complaints always make me feel self-conscious and apologetic, because they are about such small things.
My grievances are small potatoes.
Tiny potatoes.
They are basically little birdseed-sized starchy pellets.
It's ridiculous to have them.
But I do.
I feel tired and rushed.
I was built for leisure.
I know this about myself--that I was designed for solitary wandering and musing.
So when I don't have time to solitarily wander and muse, my soul gets sick.
This week, someone gave me an assignment, and I almost cried.
Literally.
I had to quick smile and make a joke so that I wouldn't cry.
I cry when I feel stress-bally.
It's embarrassing.
I cried at the gym once.
It was pretty lame.

Solitaire Games

Today I am reminded of two games I like to play with myself:

1) The Hibernator

…wherein, I hover over several literal and figurative delete buttons. Delete facebook. Delete blog. Delete emails 1-76. Delete my social calendar. Delete ambitions. Delete plans. Tell everyone, "Nevermind." Delete delete delete. Reduce my life to: gym, work, home, self, sleep.

It happens around the same time--this time--every year. Whether it's cooling temperatures or overwhelmption, I don't know, but something triggers my introversion, and I find myself blushing from overexposure and lunging for caves.

2) Do I Have a Right To?

…wherein, I fall into various levels of sour mood-itis and then debate whether or not I have a right to. Do I have a right to feel irritable when people in the world are starving? Do I have a right to get mad about relatively small bits when the world is riddled with gross civil injustice? Do I have a right to feel blue when I have no overt reason? Do I have a right to feel tired and overwhelmed at my desk job when bomb squads are tiptoeing around the desert?

Because I really like the idea of accepting the full gamut of humanity, which includes sour moods, irritation, fatigue, and bouts of overwhelmption. I don't want to put any more pressure on myself to be perfect than I would on any other person. I really hate the word "should." I really do. I think it's a loaded and destructive word, and I don't like it. Every time I hear it--including from my own mouth--I wince.

But I also really like the idea of always trying to be better, to relax, to keep a healthy sense of priorities, to identify my weaknesses and work to improve. How much improvement is enough? How much improvement is an unrealistic demand for perfection and repression?

Scorekeeping for this game is particularly difficult.

land of time and plenty.

On vacation, I decided that I would be a lot happier if I parceled out my free time with scheduled activities. "I'm sorry, Mother, I cannot come for a visit, as I am to read a book of my choice from 6:00 pm to 7:15 pm and then loll about humming from 7:15-7:30 and then use the toilet before penning deeply philosophical thoughts from 7:38 pm to 9:00 pm bed time."

I decided to call it a time budget.

This time budget is also part of my COFFEE project--a collaborative blog experiment with 9 other women in which we've all chosen projects that scare or challenge us in some way, and we blog about the process of completing that task. That's here. http://coffeeisanacronym.blogspot.com (It's still developing, and we're in the first round of posts, which is a learning process. So please forgive our rough seams.) My project is to sing and play guitar in front of strangers. This requires regular guitar practice to minimize the suckage. Regular guitar practice requires time. … Time budget.

Other things I don't make time for: writing (the real kind), reading (non work related materials), writing letters (that require stamps), playing the piano (no parenthetical notation required), art projects (that require paint or pastels or cutting and pasting), and meditation (so I can stop this anxious breathing thing that has returned. 1000 times a day I am telling myself, "You're fine. You can breathe. Just breathe. Relax. There. Breath. See?" I will need to write this into my time budget. "Drop your shoulders. Breathe.")

I think it's ironic that I made this decision while laying on the beach in Florida. But what I know of myself is that if I have a lot of free time, I will waste a lot of free time. And I also think I know that sometimes to free yourself from something requires a plan, and sometimes plans look like schedules. So if I am going to free myself from shameful stagnancy, I need a plan.

I started the time budget 2 days ago, got overwhelmed, and quit (How to Be a Smashing Success by Patresa Hartman).

Yesterday, I picked it up and got to work. I learned: I can't do everything. I wake up at 4:30 a.m. to go to the gym 4 of 5 work mornings. By the time I get home from work at 5:15, I have about 4 hours to work with. There must be eating and canine carousing and packing gym bags for the next day and husband time and picking up after myself and using the toilet. I end up with about 1.5 hours to write, read, play guitar, meditate, and paint. It's so depressingly confining, and I just can't figure how to make this work. My head feels like it's going to explode.

It's a problem with proportions.

On vacation, I was in a place I loved, doing things that made my soul happy, and I felt so… right, so lined up. I thought of a million ways I could make this life my reality. I could run away to work with sea turtles. I could live like a bum. I could write sonnets for cash. Over dinner, C looked at me and said, "We need to make sure we do this at least once every other year." And it occurred to me how completely absurd that was. For 5 days every 2 years do something you really love? What?!

Likewise, I am looking at my time budget… For 1.5 hours every 24 hours, do something you really love! Huh?!

Obviously, I know the secret is to FIND what you love, MAKE what you love, BRING what you love, to the other 22.5 hours and to the other 725 days. And I'm usually pretty good at doing that. I have a great job that allows a surprising amount of creativity (even if the environment is kind of soul sucking). But when you look at it in really cold terms, we (most of us) are seriously f'd up with how we have constructed our lives. Totally out of proportion and off-balance. No wonder there's so much chronic illness and depression. How could we expect to be healthy?

And furthermore, how do we have time to keep reproducing? Holy cow. I'm looking at my time budget and thinking there is not possibly enough time for babies. I simply cannot have children with this kind of schedule. Who has time for babies?

A Dozen Items of Note Regarding the Gym at 5:00 A.M.

If you're looking for deep thoughts today: Keep looking, Sucker. I just want to talk about the gym.

A Dozen Items of Note Regarding the Gym at 5:00 a.m.

1. Sometimes, if I have not slept well, I never actually wake up. No amount of pushing or pulling or jogging or squatting will revive me. I get lost in small places. I stand in front of the free weight rack and can't remember what I was doing. I lay down to crunch abs and count ceiling tiles and calculate area instead. I love to calculate area. It's compulsive.

2. Sometimes, the "functional training" area is full, and I need floor space. I configure myself strangely, using a sliver in the corner and turned the wrong direction. Then, 3 minutes later the area clears, and I am left there in my strange configuration, and I want to shout to the people over there on the ellipticals: "Hey, this made sense about 3 minutes ago!" (That happened this morning.)

3. I don't like hamstring curls. They make the backs of my knees feel weird and snappy.

4. I like it when people put things back where they found them. I like this a lot. I wish it happened consistently. I don't understand why it doesn't. I mean, you're here, and you appear to be here to work, which means you're probably not lazy. If you've just done 3 sets of 12 reps, what's the big hairy deal about extending the effort to put it away? Sheesh.

5. I like that there is no meat market silliness at 5 a.m. It is an entirely different scene at 5 p.m. I do not like that scene. I do not like it at all.

6. I like it when there are lots of treadmills available and new arrivals leave at least 1 empty treadmill between me and them. Sometimes, when there are lot and lots of treadmills available and someone takes the one RIGHT NEXT TO ME, I want to turn and say, "Hey, really? Why?" And I would mean it. I would really and truly want an explanation.

7. I like it when romantically linked men and women work out separately even though they came together. I don't know exactly why it bothers me to see romantically linked men and women trying to be weight bench partners, but it does. I roll my eyes a lot at these people, which isn't very nice, but it's 5 a.m..

8. I dislike the stationary bike. I think I would like it a little better if I could dip the seat back just a bit. I always feel like I'm crotch-sliding down hill.

9. I have declared a locker in the locker room as MINE. It isn't mine. I don't pay money for it. My name isn't on it. But when someone puts their crap in it, I feel genuinely put-out. How dare they? Don't they know who I am? Rookies.

10. I don't like grunting. Some people--and men are the worst--grunt and it sounds orgasmic, and that totally creeps me out. Dude, seriously. Keep it in the bedroom.

11. I check myself out in the mirror. It's hard not to. There are mirrors all over the damn place. Sometimes I see myself and I think, "Huh, I really thought I looked better than this." But the mirrors in the group fitness room--which I commandeer on mornings there are no classes--are extremely flattering.

12. On days when I skip the gym, I have a hard time getting ready for work at home. I forget what to do. I don't know what I've washed and what I've not washed. I can't find things. I am usually late to work.

That is all I have to say today.

crazy space station satellite

The weather has been awesome. I hope it is still awesome in one week and 3 days while I am running 26.2 miles.

Over lunch today, I walked to the river. I turned off my ipod, took off my shoes, and stared all pensive Victorian heroine like at the water. Then I realized the Des Moines River is really pretty stanky looking. I'm not sure how I would describe the color of this river, but I imagine there are a lot of dirty gym socks at the bottom.

Then I looked at the skyline, and it wasn't really all that attractive. Two cranes by the YMCA, and half of the buildings were capped by crazy space station satellite antennas.

People jogged over the bridge wearing sweat bands.

It seemed kind of bizarre that I found it relaxing and clarifying -- like finding God in a burnt cheese sandwich covered with cat hair. I hope this doesn't make me a pessimist.

Other important notes:

My dog is peeing on things. It's my fault, and I feel horrible. She has allergies. They were bad enough that I let the vet give her prednisone even though I really really really didn't like it. The prednisone has made her incontinent. Is there anything worse? She peed on my chair, on the couch, on the new carpet, in the basement.

The thing about prednisone is you can't just stop taking it. You have to taper, gradually. So once you start... well, tough nuggets. If you stop, it screws up a bunch of other things. Poor Kaya just has to keep peeing on herself until my mistake has flushed itself out.

I think I'm too tired to write any more important notes. The Apprentice is on. I didn't mean to watch it. It makes me nervous. I don't understand money contests, so I hope it's about more than sharp suits and slick hair (but I have my doubts).

air swimming

I once had a dream that I was a special investigator who could sense the presence of the devil. I found a dead chicken in a shower and knew it was the devil. And then, I knew that I was both the chicken and the devil. I refer to this as The Chicken Devil Dream.

I had another dream that a tall skinny man sat in a dark corner of an empty room holding an old traveling doctor's bag, and Magic Johnson was walking around with his head cut off asking for wooden nickels.

I used to swim through air in my dreams. I once air-swam laps around a giant plantation house.

I am frequently chased. I am frequently running through the dark and jumping over picnic tables and making out with Keanu Reeves under stadium bleachers. A few weeks ago, a giant green dinosaur stomped through the neighborhood and split my house in half.

These are my dreams.

The following are Chris's dreams:

Last night, Chris dreamed that he ordered a new screen door for the back porch and called to have a tree trimmer come out to groom the walnut in the backyard. The end.

One of us has an easier time with the idiosyncrasies of the world than the other.

unabashedly imperfect

It's 9:30. I should be much more tired than I am. I think working out at 5 a.m. every morning has reduced my body's dependency on sleep.

Because I like to observe my own neurosis, and because I believe my neurosis is not unique and likely matches your neurosis, which makes it a shared neurosis between most people and therefore probably really shouldn't even be called "neurosis" but instead should just be called human nature, I would like to recant the frenetic brain activity that happened after my last blog post, the song blog:

Neurosis: This is attention seeking behavior. Stop, immediately.

Rationality: Why is posting a song blog any more attention seeking than posting a word blog?

Neurosis: This song is horrible. You suck. You are horrible. You should be ashamed. Stop, immediately.

Rationality: It doesn't have to be good if it's honest.

Neurosis: Yes, it does. Why do anything at all if you can't do it perfectly, Idiot?

Rationality: But, there is no such thing as perfect.

Neurosis: Maybe, but this is really awful. Be ashamed. Stop.

Rationality: But, isn't it liberating to publicly and freely acknowledge your own awfulness? To bare your limited skill set and failed attempts? Isn't it soul-freeing to bite the dust of imperfection in front of lots and lots of people? Isn't that the only true way to find joy--to release all unrealistic expectations for self and just...be?

Neurosis: No. Stop.

Rationality: But, maybe someone somewhere won't think it's awful. There is an audience for awful things. Just listen to all that weird obscure indie music. They can't even sing, and people love them!

Neurosis: They have horrible taste and their opinions don't count.

Rationality: But it's not okay to cap honest expression based on outside opinions.

Neurosis: Have you no pride?

Rationality: Yes, I have too much.

Anyway, just a sampling.

Another frenetic dialogue is happening right now as I type. But I'm going to just leave it at this.

Good night. Sleep tight. May tomorrow be wildly and unabashedly imperfect, and may you fail publicly and not give a flying tin can of shit.

i like to make things.

It is the last day of my stay-cation, and I feel nervous. It's already 7:48 a.m. Last days of any-cations always go too fast. I will blink and it will be 7:48 p.m. So much pressure to enjoy each moment. This one! Enjoy this one! Focus, P! I froth when I discover moments have passed, and I've missed them, let them slip unacknowledged. I am sweaty and wild-eyed with moment-marking.

An exaggeration. Really, I'm just eating yogurt and fruit and drinking some coffee. But I really do feel nervous, and I really do keep looking at the clock. 7:52. Dammit!

I know that I do not want to spend all day flitting around online. I will make music and make pictures and make food and make stretching of IT Bands. I like to make things. I like to make things more than anything else. I want to spend all day making things. All day. Not just part of the day. Not just periodic 4-day stay-cations. Songs, stories, poems, dinners, pictures. My soul likes it. Craves it. I dare say, I was designed to make stuff, sometimes it's crap, but the process--I was born for that. I also like to make messes. Sometimes I even like to make things clean, but please don't tell my husband.

There is never enough time to make all the things I want to make. And that makes me so awfully nervous.

7:56.