February

Yesterday was okay, other than the fire in the building where I was down in the Village- that was scary for a few minutes.

Got an ocular migraine last night around 11:00. It lasted a little over an hour and did not include a headache. I didn't have anything to eat on the "trigger foods" list, had an average amount of sleep, was not around a lot of bright light, and wasn't under any stress at the time. I can't figure these things out.

I made an eye appointment for the 21st. Now I just need to find a place to stay (can't stay with Brian and Rebecca) and make a train & car reservations (since it's over $100 cheaper to take the train to BWI and then rent a car from there than to rent a car from here on a holiday weekend). Paula and Harvey may be in Baltimore that weekend too, so maybe I can see them as well.

In our secular world, how did Christmas become more of a popular holiday to celebrate than Easter? I think it's about the timing of the holidays. It's easier to celebrate Christmas with end of the year parties than celebrate Easter at the beginning of spring- I guess people would rather celebrate the end of the year than the beginning of spring. And since Christmas is so close to New Years, it's easier to have a party season (especially at the end of the year). The party season seems to get more and more elabourate every year. So many people take off the whole week, and those that don't take off still have slower times at work and may take off a day and/or leave early. A week gives people time to do holiday-related things (buy presents and decorations, attend parties, go to Christmas-related entertainment...), which means businesses can find ways to create lots of holiday-related things (selling things for presents and decorations, selling party-related things [food & beverages, party room rentals at restaurants and hotels], producing Christmas-related entertainment...). Not that businesses don't find ways of having consumers buy as much as possible around Easter- they just don't have as many opportunities (no office Easter parties, not many Easter-related performances, not many Easter songs for albums or songbooks...).

My schedule is so full this week- almost every minute filled from early morning until late at night- work, school/papers, customer service calls, personal calls, errands, mail, odds and ends...

Tonight, our nasty instructor informed us that we have to go to The Met and The Frick by Monday. We'll be doing a project & paper on 1 of his 2 favourite artists (either Rembrandt or Vermeer- why is he so limiting?). Wish he gave us more notice for the museum visits. If he told us on Monday, I could have gone today before class. Now I think the only time I can go is Sunday (I could also go on Monday in between classes, but they're closed on Monday).

Someone from Hilton actually responded to my complaints about our Hawaii stay. She said she'd forwarded my complaints to various people at the property and that she's sent me some sort of package that I should expect in the mail shortly. It's great that she responded, but why do people have to resort to complaints in writing before someone will take responsibility for problems?

My apartment building just got taken over by another company. How will that affect my rent? Not going to worry until I have something concrete to worry about.

Looks like everyone's up early (or late) today. I got emails from people this morning between 2:30 and 6:00. Jon was the most surprising (at 2:30). He's never up too late or too early, and if he is, he's certainly not sending emails.

Traffic's obnoxious this morning. On top of that, there's construction noise (with 6 major projects within 2 blocks, it's hard to get away from it).

So I'll be staying with Jon & Michelle when I'm in Baltimore. Glad Rebecca suggested them- for some reason, I forgot about their house as a possibility for a place to stay. Better to stay with them than Neil & Maxine's since: 1. it's closer to my eye appointment on Monday, and 2. I can get a ride with them to Brian and Rebecca's party and not have to leave early because of the can't-drive-at-night issue. Now I just need to do train/car reservations and I'll be all set. Leaving the 19th and coming back the 21st.

This year seems to be a year of fires for me. Yesterday I got caught in the termoil of a fire on the UES- fortunately, I wasn't in the building. Aside from that though, yesterday's errands went smoothly, so it balanced out.

Got to do some problem solving for work today. I like problem solving. Didn't exactly solve anything today but got down some good thoughts on the subject. Also had some market research crap to do; fortunately it didn't take too long. Today I also made some not-too-obnoxious customer service calls, reorganised my schedule more efficiently, and made train & car reservations for Baltimore (feeling positive about this trip).

In some of my spare time, I've been writing to elected officials on issues of my concern. I don't have time to do anything more than that right now, but at least this way I feel like I can at least do something other than complain. I've also been researching organisations I'd like to support and will make a list of them to give to people interested in getting me gifts- I'd rather have them make a donation to organisations I'd like to help than for them to get me something I don't need (or want).

I'm feeling better financially right now- really didn't feel too comfortable November-January.

Have I mentioned anything about the weather since I've been home? It's winter. It's cold. And as long as it isn't too windy (like it was when I was out this afternoon) and I'm dressed well enough, I like it. Especially if it's not too humid. I like dry cold and dry heat.

My question for people supporting private/personal retirement accounts instead of current social security is this: yes, the stock market can make some money over time, but there are also dips in the market- what if you are retiring during a dip? Has anyone addressed this with a real answer?

After this movie's over, I'll have watched all 3 movies I rented the other day (the other 2 being "Nashville" and "Mr. Smith Goes to Washington"- a theme of political films with a city in the title). The only way I've watched them was to watch while doing other things (work, mail, etc), but it's better than no movies.

Today I wrote a paper on Strindberg, cut my hair, finished dealing with the more difficult things in my pile of mail, and did some odds and ends. I feel like I've been productive. Tonight I'll finish up researching organisations, do some work, and some more odds and ends. Tomorrow I need to go to The Met and then head down to the Village for a few errands (hope the weather's as nice tomorrow as it was today).

Traffic has been atrocious today! It's just been a big free-for-all in my intersection, and the honking has been non-stop. Extremely difficult to work under these conditions. It's also not contributing to my enjoyment of "The Bostonians".

I am not new to the World Wide Web. Nor is one of my weaknesses learning how to navigate a website. However, I must say, Turn it In is presenting me with a real problem. For all of our world theatre assignments, we have to submit them through this site in order to detect plagiarism. Well registering and submitting my paper was no problem. However, finding the report it's supposed to generate to make sure we have a low percentage of words that are not our own, impossible to find. We're supposed to print out this report to turn in with our paper. Plus, the report should show a low percentage (something we can fix and resubmit if it's too high). How can I resubmit if I can't find the thing to begin with? Good thing I found this out (hopefully) early enough. I emailed the instructor and (hopefully) she should get back to me before tomorrow night.

Okay, time to start some work.

I witnessed a horrible accident on my street last night (around 1:30). I was looking out my window to see if I could see any stars (I couldn't), when I saw a cab slam into a car heading the opposite direction. Scary! Fortunately, it didn't give me nightmares.

Forgot the Super Bowl was tonight, until I heard a guy on the bus talking about it on the phone with one of his buddies. And since I have no interest in the sport (even though I was a Patriots fan until recently), I'll write something about the halftime show censorship nonsense. Where's the logic in this stuff? Only looking at the "indecent" exposure censorship, why was last year's halftime episode so much worse than some of the stuff show on other primetime TV shows? I was taking the bus down 5th, and in the heart of midtown (I think it was across from Trump Tower), there was a store with some of the most tasteless lingerie I've ever seen. Why isn't that censored? And I also saw a huge billboard with a woman lying on her stomach, wearing a skimpy tank-top and some kind of barely-there thong underwear (so you could see her ass). And unlike the halftime show, you can't turn off a billboard or a window display if you don't approve of it. so, like most things, the halftime show censorship (and let's not forget about the Super Bowl commercials censorship) caught the public's attention and the media stuck with it. And I haven't even gotten into the why-is-our-country-obsessed-with-"indecent"-exposure issue. But now that I've brought it up, why is out country obsessed with "indecent" exposure? And I find it so odd, what people consider to be wrong and what they'll allow. We consider someone's breast exposed on TV to be wrong yet paintings and statues of nude men and women in museums are considered art. I really like the 2 Times articles on censorship this week (Maureen Dowd's and Frank Rich's)- they both bring up some great points.

Today went fairly smoothly. Buses showed up when needed (I even got a hybrid, limited bus heading down 5th- very quick ride), I found what I needed at The Met quickly, and my errands were mostly successful (the unsuccesses were expected- things that I wish were available that don't seem to exist anymore in this increasingly mainstream world). And the weather was warm- windy, but warm (I think in the upper 40s).

Still haven't heard from the world theatre instructor. She hasn't replied to my email and her phone doesn't have an answering machine (or I guess these days, I should say voice mail). I'm pretty sure my paper's free from plagiarism, so maybe when I explain about the report issue, she'll just let me turn in the paper by itself. In fact, I bet I'm not the only one who had the problem (unless it's a luck thing and everyone else got an email with how to access their reports and resubmit their papers or something).

Kristin's having a party on March 5th. If I wasn't taking other weekend trips and/or having so many busy weekends at home in the near future, I would consider going. I'd love to see Kristin and meet more of her friends.

I was either too busy or too mentally exhausted to write the past couple days, and I still don't really have the time now but I'm taking it anyway since I won't have any time at all for the next few days.

Monday was productive. Class, read "Dream Play" during my break, class, work, did a little cleaning, and caught up on some personal emails I'd been neglecting for too long.

I enjoyed "Dream Play". It has both a unique style and contains some similar thoughts that I've had about life, the universe, and everything.

About 80% of yesterday was spent doing research for various things (the other 20% was spent sleeping, 2 phone calls, and a little straightening). By 9:00 PM, I was extremely mentally exhausted, but I pushed myself to finish everything since there wasn't any other time I could have worked on it.

Today I had a semi-productive meeting with Paula. And we did that at Tea and Sympathy- always nice to be somewhere I really like.

But in slightly bad news, on the way back uptown, we were in a cab that got into an accident (fortunately, it was a minor one). I don't take cabs often, but when I do, most of the time the driver's driving "skills" make me terrified. Today was no exception. I especially don't like when they speed downhill since the brakes never seem to really work well enough to stop in time. And ever since I told one cab driver to slow down and he responded by driving even more like a maniac (yes, I reported it- no, I never heard anything else about it), I've been nervous about suggesting a driving tip while in a cab. But I think I will write to the media about the increasing number of scary cab drivers in the city (not that my story suggestions have ever been accepted in the past, but this one seems more up their alley).

Eytan called Monday night... to wish me a happy birthday. He was only a month off (he's horrible at remembering things about people, but this is the first time he messed up my birthday- I told him to keep a calendar). So we talked for a few minutes. Then he called last night and started the conversation with a "happy birthday" ;). He called to tell me a random thing, then we talked for a few more minutes. He loves procrastinating. I've been forced to learn how not to love it as much anymore.

I've never heard of the practice of putting an ash cross on your forehead for Ash Wednesday until today. Well, technically I didn't hear of it, I saw it. I saw over 40 people with them in various places around the city (West Village, Midtown, Upper East Side). Was there some kind of memo spread around the Christian community to have this practice be more widespread this year? Anyone know? I'd look into it myself but don't feel like taking the time.

What I also won't take the time to do is go to a surprise birthday party for Maureen. It's on the 18th, and technically I could leave for Baltimore a day earlier so I could be there, but it's not worth it. Maureen won't care if I'm there or not, and I probably wouldn't get much out of it.

The construction across the street has been extremely loud recently (sometimes it's louder than the honking and louder than my music). I can't sleep, can't think, can't hear anything else when I'm in my apartment. I hope the loud part of the construction is over soon.

Recently I've been having some irrational thoughts of dying- like just as I'm about to get on a train, thinking there might be a bomb on it or just as I'm about to fall asleep, suddenly panic that I might not wake up. Don't know where this stuff is coming from, but I really hope they don't start to occur more frequently. So far, I've been fairly good at rationalising myself back to normal quickly.

Back to work. At least people are making it easy on me today and not sending too much email (hate those days when I'm extremely busy and then my inbox gets bombarded, pouring more salt on the wound).

Busy.

I got a package in the mail last Thursday. Good thing Neil was here to remind me what it was. The mailing label had no return address. I opened it up and found Hawaii-related things inside. Still had no clue. Then Neil said, "It's the package from Hilton". Oh right. I would have figured it out eventually. So they sent me a few kinds of jelly. Too bad I never really use jelly. I think I'll give them to acquaintances next Christmas.

Another major accident on my street last Friday and then another one Sunday night. Does this have to get worse before the city will make some major changes?

Scary (not creepy) doorman is back. He was working all last weekend (days and nights). Haven't seen him in about a year.

I was actually home when the handyman came to fix the heat and stove. The stove was easy- I didn't have the burner things lined up the right way. So now they're lined up and I know for next time. Then I asked him why my heating/cooling units stop working so often, and he said sometimes they just lock up and some are more sensitive than others. Wish I could get some that aren't so sensitive. Two days after he fixed them (none of them were working), the one in the living room and the one in my bedroom stopped working again. Just one more electronic thing in my apartment that doesn't work. Can't just one piece of technology work reliably? Also while he was here, he told me I didn't have a carbon monoxide detector (Gulliani would not be happy with me), so he put one in. In the process, he discovered my burned out hall light. He offered to put a new bulb in for me, and in the process, learned that the fixture was jammed (from when Jon broke it). I didn't feel like explaining how it broke, so I just played dumb. He said he would fix it later (no clue when that'll be- I'm obviously in no rush).

Last Saturday morning, we learned that Uncle Dave (Paula's uncle) died. I would have gone to the funeral if I wasn't so busy. Paula and Neil didn't go either (for various reasons). I did call Marcell though (it was her father), to offer my condolences.

The auction was the most exhausting ever. I still like it better than most of my responsibilities though. And this particular stuff (especially the Marihuana Tax Act stuff) was pretty exciting. It was fun to be a part of it.

But the exhausting auction made Sunday and Monday beyond exhausting for me. There's way too much going on in all areas of my life right now (too busy to go into detail)- no rest for the weary.

But Tuesday was a productive and creative day (wrote a rather good fictional story for part two of the Rembrandt paper and did some cool stuff with music for a few minutes- would have done more but I really couldn't even afford that few minute break). Tuesday was also spent running errands, working, reading & researching for the world theatre class, laundry, a little cleaning, and opened some of the mail (nothing I need to deal with until I get back from Baltimore, so I'll finish that up early next week).

Wednesday I could barely get motivated for anything, and I barely got everything finished (and I didn't finish figuring out how to answer yesterday's world theatre weekly essay test- after over an hour of looking into it, I blew it off- doing that with one out of something like 17 of these stupid tests can't hurt too much). So instead of worrying about that, I used the time to look into which anti-realism movement I want to do for my research paper (I chose Dada- probably more difficult than some of the others because of how undefinable it was, and finding strict Dada information might be tougher than, say, Surrealism, but I think it'll be the most interesting).

Then I woke up yesterday morning with a scratchy throat and some congestion. And I kept getting more and more tired as the morning wore on. So I skipped class (good one to miss, especially since I wasn't prepared to answer the essay anyway) and used the time to rest. Rest! What a wonderful thing. I still don't feel great, but I haven't gotten any worse (knock on keyboard).

The only time I didn't rest yesterday was when I was doing some work and when I had to run out to pick up a package at David's to mail for him (he couldn't leave his apartment and I guess had no one else to ask for help).

In lighting class Monday and Wednesday nights, we watched most of "The Age of Innocence", with Ian's running commentary. Some of it was slightly useful (mentions of a scene within a scene or poses from famous paintings, useful), but most of it was unnecessary (constant mentions of the lighting coming from windows or "this is an exterior shot in the winter"- gee, really? the snow on the ground and the characters in winter coats didn't clue me in).

I've been having flashbacks of Phoenix recently. Wouldn't mind taking a long weekend there at some point in the near future, but I doubt it'll happen. There are so many places I've been wanting to go recently and barely any time to do any of them.

But where I will be going (tomorrow) is Baltimore. Leaving in the morning, will be home Monday evening. And in between I'll be doing some work, some school work, dinner with family, Brian and Rebecca's party, eye appointment, and hopefully having smooth transportation experiences (knock on keyboard again).

The train to Baltimore was late and crowded. Then it's a hassle getting to the rental car location since it's no longer at the airport exactly. You have to take a shuttle bus from the train station to the airport (that one makes a few stops on the way) and then a shuttle from the airport to the rental car place. I guess it was worth saving the money by doing that, rather than renting a car from here at $100/day. And the weather was pretty nasty on the way home (snow & freezing rain), so it was nice not having to drive in that.

After finally getting to the car, I spent the couple hours before dinner doing some reading for school. Then I had dinner with Paula, Harvey, Neil, Maxine, and Abby at Due before heading back to Jon & Michelle's, where I hung out with them for a while (and played ping pong with Jon- that was nice)and then did some work before bed.

Sunday was Brian and Rebecca's party. They did an amazing job. And their house is so spacious, the large group of people didn't make it feel crowded at all. Talked to some of Brian's friends, the ones I see every few years but don't really know, and listened to their complicated life stories (like his friend Mike who is a lawyer in DC and married to a doctor about to do a fellowship in North Carolina, so Mike will stay in DC during the week and fly to NC on the weekends and will hire an au pair in NC to help with their 6 month old daughter- at least it's only for a year).

Monday was my eye appointment. He suggested that my sinuses might be the reason for my fainting issues, so I'll have to look into that at some point. And he changed the prescription for my left eye to make my vision more binocular, or something like that- I don't completely understand eyesight, but I should read more about it since I find it interesting and it may be useful to know.

But after several times of reminding myself to get Dr. Billig to fill out the eye test form for my license renewal, I forgot to have him do that while I was there. So now I need to make a trip down to the DMV. I'm doing that today, in between a meeting for work and getting together with David (he's up here for a few days and staying near the DMV, so it's convenient). Hopefully the DMV won't take too long, and I'll have more than a few minutes to spend with David before heading up to class.

The traffic has been quiet at night the past 2 nights- what a wonderful thing. It's not quiet during the day though, and that combined with the super-obnoxious jackhammering makes for some ridiculously loud days.

I conveniently felt much better while I was out of town, but yesterday morning I woke up with a serious cold. Still feel lousy today and of course no medication is working. Hope this one doesn't drag out for too long.

Yesterday was very busy with both work and school. They also finally came to fix my heat (can't believe it took a week- good thing I wasn't home for 2 of the days). If it stops working again in the next few weeks, I'm going to call the building manager and ask if I can get new units that might work slightly better than my current ones.

Lots of other things on my mind but no time to get into all that now. I'll try to make the time at the end of the week, in between all the projects I currently have going on.

But one random comment: Has anyone ever done a caricature of Tommy Thompson? He already looks like one to begin with.

Wednesday was windy. I'm assuming that's why my ear was in major pain that evening- from running all over the city in the wind with a bad cold. I now no longer have a fever but my throat still feels like a golf ball is lodged in it. And I'm still tired even though I've been sleeping quite a bit. This is the last cold/flu for me until next winter. I can't deal with feeling like this anymore and everything's piling up since I can't get myself to do enough every day. I used to have more control over colds- usually only got 1 per year (around Christmas). I'm gonna try to figure out how to do that again, and my schedule will just have to cooperate.

Got an ocular migraine Wednesday afternoon- too sick to really care that it was bothering me. It only lasted about 30 minutes- got it on the subway and lasted through my 15 minute walk from the park to school. I had 2 cups of caffinated tea- I doubt that's what caused it. Could it be because I slept more than normal the night before? Wish I could figure these things out.

I've now seen 2 people at school on crutches because of getting hit by a car. I guess we're just supposed to accept this concept rather than fix the traffic issues in the city.

The library is not being very kind to me on this Dada project. First, they didn't have several of the titles I was hoping to use. Then I finally found 3 possibly useful sources, and went to the Midtown location (the only library that supposedly had these sources). One they had, one was missing, and one they said was at the performing arts library (even though the catalogue said otherwise). This afternoon I called the performing arts library to see if they could check on that one title and see if they could help me find texts of performances at the Cabaret Voltaire (because we have to include information about a play and they don't have any of the titles I discovered over the course of my online research). I figured calling would be easier than making the effort to get over there only to find that they couldn't help me. Well, their phone lines were dead. Then I found a cool feature on their website where you could chat with a librarian in real-time. She was no help, but she tried calling the performing arts theatre desk again and told me the lines were now working. I finally got a hold of someone at the theatre desk at the performing arts library and he was helpful (I think he's the one who's helped me in the past). He agreed with me, that it was almost impossible to find useful titles for this subject in their catalogue because 90% of the texts weren't organised by title and the few that were are not in English. He did find one anthology book though that they did have a copy of (plus the critical source that they didn't have in midtown), so I'll go there on Tuesday and take care of things around here this weekend. I think it'll be more restful that way. Fortunately the timing is working out for me on this one. And I'm glad they have the main book I need at the performing arts library rather than midtown. The performing arts library is less crowded and they have more helpful employees in all areas. I really don't like the midtown library. I don't know why people praise it so much. Yes, they have a huge amount of stuff. But most of the time I go there for either work or school, they have nothing of help to me and no librarian to help me try to be creative in my scavenger hunt to find the material I need. And even when I do find sources, they take over an hour getting them to me or they tell me the item is missing (although the performing arts library takes forever to get me the material as well). I'm surprised so many things are missing, with their overprotective security policy. I got searched 6 different times on my way in and out yesterday.

It snowed again last night, for a change. Definitely a snow-filled winter. And of course traffic was insanely horrible.

I do not like this growing trend of entertainment in our news and news in our entertainment. Last night, Peter Jennings had a 2 hour news program on UFOs. And then we have recent movies like "Hotel Rwanda" and "Fahrenheit 9/11". It really should be the other way around.

I remembered part of my dream from last night. I was in a big house- Brian, Paula, and some other people were there. A woman who I think was a doctor making house calls took my temperature, and she wouldn't tell me what was wrong with me. I finally got her to tell me what the thermometer said- it was 22.4. I realised that was an extremely low temp (even in celcius) and asked her to please tell me what my chances were. She finally told me I had about a 50% of surviving. Then there were other parts of the dream I don't quite remember (I think they involved some sort of adventure), but I do remember at the end being on David Luther Ct. and asking about new residents in the area. I think I knew some people living on Happy Hollow, or something like that.

So last night I slept on and off for about 10 hours. My throat is a little better, but I still have an overwhelming amount of congestion. I keep pushing things on my to-do list further off into next week. That should make next week lovely- no clue how I'm going to get everything done- my schedule can't afford sick days. But I just can't get myself to do too much this week.

Today hasn't been entirely unproductive though. I did a ton of reading for school, did a moderate amount of cleaning (will finish up tomorrow), and made some phone calls I'd been putting off (fortuantely, I got to leave messages for most of them, putting the ball in their court). Now I plan on doing some more school reading, doing some work, and replying to some long overdue emails (and some more recent ones too).

I still want to write about some issues I've been thinking about, but my brain is too tired to deal with them now. Maybe tomorrow...

Last night, aside from the necessary stuff, I took some time to deal with pictures. I put up the last few from 2004 and half-way organised Hawaii and the beginning of this year's pictures. Maybe today I'll finish those and get them up here already. Today I also need to do some work, do some reading for school, organise the little amount I have for my Dada paper, deal with a huge pile of mail, and take care of a few odds and ends. I already cleaned the apartment and did some work this morning.

My heat in the living room isn't working again. This is beyond ridiculous. Not that I have time, but I'm calling the building manager tomorrow.

I'm still extremely congested, but I'm feeling much better today. I got about 5 hours of sleep last night and woke up well rested. I was planning on sleeping more, but I was wide awake when I woke up and couldn't get back to sleep. Guess I had slept enough for the past few days. I loved the sleep I got- so amazing that all aspects of it worked out (being tired enough to not have the traffic wake/keep me up, being able to put things off for next week so I'd have more time to sleep...).

Still constantly thinking about big issues but not going to take the time to write about it now (instead I'll use the time to deal with my pictures). I'm sure I'll find time to write in the next few weeks- here are the topics:
- people having conversations in sound bites
- legislation for things that should be individual choice
- the suburbanisation of Manhattan

Click ME- I know you want to...
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