I blame the suckfest (that was today) on the time change.

Or perhaps my petulant four year-old inner child is to blame. I haven’t decided.

Waking up this morning sucked, getting into the car and having the gas light go to empty sucked, getting to the gas station and finding out that pump I pulled up to was broken sucked, being called “sweetie” by the gas station attendant also sucked, going to Dunkin’ Donuts to get a hot chocolate and whole wheat bagel with cream cheese was good - until I pulled up to the window to pay and learned that they were out of hot chocolate (I got chai instead) and out of vegetable cream cheese. I asked for scallion - to which they said yes… and then no. So I got no bagel with no cream cheese and just went to the train station to wait out the remaining time.

Once on the train, I was just overwhelmed by (non-bagel related) sadness of a nondescript and nonspecific nature and was sitting there like a fool, crying. Not bawling… but the tears were flowing in freakish silence and being dabbed away by a Dunkin’ Donuts napkin. Not the softest stuff, so I was quite rosy-rimmed in the eye region. I got to work, turned on my computer, and it froze up. I restarted it and then it refused to accept my password. I think one of the keys was stuck, so I just did some random hitting of shift and caps lock (case sensitive passwords) to jostle it loose and managed to login. Trying to print an agenda resulted in a printer error - not a jam, but an unspecified driver or software error that prompted a pop-up box stating, “printer error” with the only option being to cancel. I hit “cancel” and restarted my computer again. Meeting, meeting, lunch. Nothing looked appetizing, and I couldn’t even find something to provide pure sustenance sans enjoyment… so I went for the cheap option. A slice of pizza. Meeting, spreadsheet, cancelled meeting… and time to go home. On the train ride home, I was wedged between two over-cologned middle-aged men, which just made that 50 minute voyage endlessly pleasant.

For dinner, I explored the as-yet-unexplored (in my world) potential of Brussels sprouts. I have a vague recollection of wanting my mother to buy them for me when I was 9 and wanting to use them as huge heads of lettuce for my Barbie dolls. Instead, they were cooked and I distinctly remember a noxious sulfurous stench which has turned me off of them ever since. Well, according to the package, the sulfur stench can be avoided through proper preparation methods.

To that end, I cooked them for about 10 minutes in a little milk (low-fat), butter (not low-fat - but compensating for the fact I did not have heavy cream for this recipe suggestion), garlic and basil. Then I removed them from the heat and squeezed a little lemon juice on them, sprinkled chopped pecans on top, and added a little salt and pepper. Toss to combine and hey - they aren’t half bad and they smell pretty good, if a little garlicky (I’m not a huge fan of garlic, but it serves a purpose.)

You know what also serves a purpose? “Jump Around” by House of Pain. The purpose it serves: inviting me to make a fool of myself by rapping along to it. Yessir. Of all the things I could possibly remember from my high school days (useful things like calculus, history, chemistry, and perhaps even driver’s ed), this is what’s stuck with me.

House of Pain - Jump Around

And “One Pure Thought” by Hot Chip. The purpose it serves: making me want to dance (and my friend Sara can attest to this… I think we’ve done the whole “dancing in the car” thing to this song a handful of times now). Nothing else does that right now. It’s magical and mood-lifting.

Hot Chip - One Pure Thought

Until tomorrow, then. Arbitrary reassignment of time. Ugh.