There’s something very comforting and meditative about going through my iTunes library ensuring order and consistency: getting rid of duplicates, resorting songs into artists’ folders, finding nomenclature variations for the same band (for example, “!!!” and “!!! (Chk Chk Chk)” or “Police” and “The Police”) and consolidating all their music into the folder with my preferred form of the band name.

Mildly pathetic, but I spent time with friends earlier tonight, so this wasn’t my entire Saturday night plan. Just the “well, I can’t sleep anyway” portion. And I feel nice and organized and in control of something in my little jumbled up world.

It’s also very comforting to go to bed late and know that I can get back into my regular sleep schedule tomorrow if I need to since I’m taking the day off on Monday. It takes the stressful edge off the insomnia — and that makes it far more bearable.

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We all feel a bit like Milla sometimes.

If only we could all look as good when we’re looking mildly poutily pissed, pregnant and had just finished our third zombie ass kicking movie.

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Again, again, again…

For a while, things go well. I find little things worth my time and worth looking forward to, especially if I shut up, stop making excuses, and actively trust the people I care about/who care about me. I have a momentary glimmer of pride in myself that I haven’t felt in more than five years.

And I ignore the feeling of dread that accompanies those good times - the cold heavy feeling in my stomach - because it can ruin the fun and because it’s stupid to always expect the other shoe to drop, right? That doesn’t always happen. No. Sometimes, you just get to enjoy life and that’s that - there’s no hostage trade-off.

But then there was this (legitimate) email I got yesterday regarding one of the shitty financial matters I’ve been working hard at resolving since April of 2005… the email contains problematic words and phrases that make it sound like I’ve just started working on this particular financial issue recently and implies that there’s a problem. I have 30 months’ worth of statements … and I was actually going to make some phone calls about later this week because this obligation should be just about finished up. I was thinking, triumphantly, that I’d be able to cross one HUGE thing off my list. So I HOPE this email is an error of some kind. I’ll be taking some time in the morning to make a phone call and try to stay calm and get to the bottom of things.

Right now, though, my head is pounding and my stomach is knotted and cold and sick. I don’t know how I’m going to get to sleep. I’m afraid to take sleeping pills when this sort of stress is keeping me up. I actually looked to see whether I had any Percocet left over from my wrist surgery… I don’t, and I kind of wish I did. That’s also a bit scary, but it’s a really effective “off” switch.

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So I did some stuff…

Saturday was a trip to the Woodbury Commons and then the Storm King Art Center. I will need to go back to Storm King since I was there a bit too close to closing time and didn’t get to walk around as much as I would’ve liked (but there are 500 acres to explore, so I think an entire day would probably be appropriate). I didn’t take many pictures at all since I was walking around and took the tram ride to see the highlights, but I did get one decent photo in the bunch - this one of Free Ride Home by Kenneth Snelson.

I’d like to go back on an overcast day… and with my regular “old ” SLR camera (yes, I’ve got one of those - a Canon EOS Rebel 2000 which I’ve sadly underused and should really study up on and get the magic of it) instead of the point-and-shoot digital.

Yesterday was fun with the family and today was fun with friends. And then guilt with family and now sitting here debating whether or not I want to open up the DVDs I bought today. An entertainment store near where my friends’ live was having a sale on “TV on DVD” boxed sets — “The X-Files” were included in this promotion.

After several aborted/thwarted attempts at acquiring the Asian boxed sets of the complete 9 seasons of that show, I’d just about given up on ever owning any of them. The show has some good sentimental value - it takes me back to sort of pleasant memories of high school and college: a time when the theme music by Mark Snow was still kind of cool and eerie instead of hokey and played out and an inside joke with friends (because we’re nerds like that). And how an FBI agent found my “Trust No One” t-shirt amusing when we were making small talk during a real-life encounter (I wasn’t smart enough to be the one in trouble). Ah, memories of the late 90s.

Back to DVDs. Here they were — $25 a season. Cheaper than Amazon. I’m not rich (or even what I’d consider happily financially solvent), but I figured I could treat myself to two seasons and spend the $50 since I haven’t touched my work bonus yet and didn’t buy anything at the Commons on Saturday and the only thing I got this weekend otherwise was gas for the car. So I bought them. And now I’m feeling some minor buyer’s remorse since I haven’t really been buying anything for myself lately (other than the odd book or two once a month - and I don’t consider those to be as much of a luxury, though I know they are), and consequently have been broken of the habit a little and feel kind of guilty. I’m not the kind of person who experiences buyer’s remorse, so this is deeply disturbing on many levels.

Is this just a phase or maybe a complete change in lifestyle and philosophy? Is this stemming from my new eating habits and just sort of paring down on all kinds of “unnecessary consumption”? Having only what is needed of anything (food, material things) and not concerning myself with the rest?

I won’t open them tonight in any event, and I’ll (briefly) sleep on it since the sleep situation is as crappy as ever. I’ll probably be up at 4:45 again (that seems to be the magic number). Grrr. Back to work tomorrow… but it’s a four-day work week, so it will be blissfully full of work to keep me nice and busy (I’m not being facetious) and zip by. I am hating all these empty hours of non-work life, so I don’t know what I’d do if my work time started to be empty, too. Thankfully, that hasn’t been a problem.

Still, just way too much time on my hands.

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