Is this a sign from the universe. Someone else who just started two months ago in my group just resigned last Tuesday. The excuse was they got a job with more money, but I think it's because my group is so disorganized and finding a job with more money isn't a bad inducement either. I think it's time to put my resume together and send it out. Two people from my group have left and gotten jobs that paid more money. That's a lot! It's four people actually if I count the two guys that left last year.

I know where I want to work. I had a chat with a friend in the industry a couple of weeks ago, and she encouraged me to apply because she thought the company was great as well. It will probably mean a longer and more expensive commute, but what the hell.

I am hating coming to work every morning as it is, and I know my attitude is taking a toll on my writing and my emotional life. It's time to leave and see where fate and my resume take.

I felt it was 9/11 all over again only this time I had my tv on and I was walking out of my kitchen with coffee and breakfast in hand to check the traffic and listen to the weather, when I realize I'm watching a news conference about a terrorist attack in London. Immediately tears sprang into my eyes and it was like I was in my car on 9/11 driving to work and listening to the public radio station guy freaking about the terrorist attack on the world trade towers.

My heart and prayers go out the Londoners who lost loves ones or whose loved ones were injured in the attacks. This is what the Israelis go through every day of their lives with the Palestinians. I don't people get that sometimes.

At least the new crush/love sent me $60 worth of books that I received this morning. That's more than the red-haired guy ever did. I mean, he always paid for meals and stuff like that, but he never gave me a present. And these books will come in handy because they're like serious science books, and I think I'll be able to use them as research material for my Elfgirl novels.

Did I mention he's an editor as well? I so want to date or become very good friends with a guy who edits books for a living.

Wow, I am so in crush/love it's sad. I called this guy twice over the weekend, and then like any old needy girl I make a comment saying "did you did think about me over the weekend." Of course I thought the guy didn't give me a second thought and I'm like whatever.

But then I get this message this morning.

**************
Miss Brenda,

I thought of you often over the weekend. I did receive your message but couldn’t reply as I spent most of this weekend underwater! I got way too much sun and I can barley keep my eyes open.
***************

Okay, maybe it's like one big lie that he thought of me, but it's nice that he said he did.

Maybe it's a good idea he doesn't live near me because I'm sure I would have tried to invite myself over to his place by now and then tried to seduce him. Maybe I was a girl lion in my animal incarnation because I so prefer to do my own hunting, especially when it comes to men. I hate being chased although it is nice when a guy does that. I much prefer to be the one to do the chasing for the most part. I feel like I'm reverting back to my 18 year old self when I think like this, because at that age when I saw a guy I liked I went after him.

I'm in Pacific Grove for the July 4th holiday. Pacific Grove is home to the famous Pebble Beach Golf Course, Asilomar Conference Center and 17 Mile Drive. Pacific Grove is next to Montery, which has the Monterey Bay Aquarium and Cannery Row. Monterey is very touristy and Pacific Grove is more laid back. I'm a block away from the beach, and thankfully the place is chock full of great restaurants.

For lunch I had a millionaire margarita, which had a splash of grand marinier on the top and was made with fresh lime juice and very expensive tequilla. I also had crab ravioli in a tomato cream sauce topped with blackened swordfish, which was so fabulous and to splurge I feasted on a mocha cream cheese cake. The restaurant was called "Fishwife" and is right next to the beach.

For dinner I had fresh tuna sashimi and rice at a place called Ocean Sushi. The owner of the restaurant had a diploma up on the wall which said he graduated from some cooking school in Osaka Japan.

Sadly the weather here is like where I live in San Francisco, all fogged over. Hopefully tomorrow it will be sunnier. I am a block away from the beach, and it would be nice to have a sunny beach day.

I'm going back to Fishwife tomorrow to try their calamari and crab cake appetizers. The menu also features a calamari sandwich, which is something I've never eaten and am dying to try. I love calamari if it's cooked right.

An update on Mr. Laguna Beach customer rep - I sent him another email today, and he emailed me back something about fear but that he was interested in seeing King Tut with me. And I emailed him back saying fear is natural, but like in Dune to remember that "fear is the mind killer". I told him I was just following the synchronicities and that he should do the same.

Then he called my cellphone and we chatted. So it turns out the customer service rep from Laguna Beach is like Mr. Scientist. Customer service rep guy actually works with the doctor who invented the device I’m wearing, and edits the guy’s books. He took courses at MIT, and worked at big pharma companies like GlaxoSmithKline. We decided that August would be a good month for me fly to LA so we could see King Tut together, and then he wanted me to call him over the weekend. We talked about everything and anything like the first time, and he promised to send me 8 pounds of books written by the scientist he’s working for. And I was like this is nice because now I don’t have to buy the books.

I am tempted to send him what I wrote about him on my blog, but I don’t want to scare the poor guy. Instead I sent another email thanking him for calling me and included an article by Harlan Ellison on the butterfly effect, and babbled on about quantum physics and then said maybe we were experiencing a "bioentanglement" . That should rock his boat enough.

I bought the book "Wholeness and the Implicate Order" by David Bohm years ago, but never read it. The book jacket reads:

David Bohm develops a theory of quantum physics which treats the totality of existence, including matter and consciousness, as an unbroken whole.

The other day I was listening to an interview about the Princeton Eggs (google it to see what these things are) given by Dean Radin, and he talked about Bohm's theory and book.

So now I guess I have to read the book.

Rest in peace, Shelby Foote. You were the best civil war/war of northern agression historian and storyteller ever!

So I decided I am in sore need of a fun summer flirtation, and emailed the customer service rep in Laguna Beach. I gave him all my phone numbers, told him I really enjoyed talking to him, to give me a call sometime, and hinted about the King Tut exhibit in LA.

I think it would be so much fun to fly down to LA on a Saturday, have the guy meet me and take me to see the King Tut exhibit. What are friends in LA for anyway, right? Besides, now I am dying to know if this guy is cute or not. He's probably way too young and has tatoos, but I've never had a tatooed young-un before and I am willing to give it a try.

So the guy emailed me back today and this is what he wrote:

Brenda,
I really enjoyed talking with you last Friday. The time just flew by! Have you ever got off the phone and wondered, “What did I just say?” I was that comfortable.

No nightmares as yet, just a strange buzzing sensation, source unidentified. Kinda weird, kinda cool.

We do seem to have a lot in common. You’re easy to talk to. I would like to give you a follow-up call if I may. In the name of research of course.

Peace, M

And I was like so excited! It's so fun to be mentally infatuated with someone. And I'm like thinking if the guy has red hair, and I so moving to LA.

So I wrote back and said "Please do call!" and then said "Maybe if we get to know each other a little better, we could see the King Tut exhibit together. Egyptian stuff is very, very cool!". I also mentioned that I was "in awe" at how comfortable we were together on the phone.

That "Grease" song is going through my head ... summer lovin' had be a blast, summer lovin' happened so fast.

So one day you’re on the phone talking to the customer service rep who’s been emailing you because your just purchased very expensive product that is supposed to improve your health is actually making you nauseous. And you’re talking to him and trying to find out why you’re having adverse reactions, and in the midst of friendly chit chat you realize you have so much in common with the stranger on the phone. That your bodies react the same way to drugs and that he’s done several of the things you’ve done, plus to boot the guy played college football at home state school and as an 18-year old you always fantasized about dating football players from the home state university. But you’re at work and you’re in a cube farm where everyone can hear you, and he’s at work and answering the phones, and after twenty minutes you hang up because you’re both got a ton of work to do. And it’s not until you’ve hung up and go back to the spreadsheet you’re working on, that you realize that the guy was echoing back qualities you’d written down in your wish list of a perfect man when he was innocently telling you about himself. And at that exact moment of realization you feel your heart skipping a beat because you start to think that maybe Mr. Perfect does exist. And it isn’t until you’ve come out of a meeting later in the afternoon that you realize that the guy reminds you so much of your ex-husband, and that you haven’t met men like than in years. And then later on in the night as you’re having dinner in Macy’s Cellar before your 8 pm theater show, you realize that the guy who you had a twenty minute conversation on the phone made you feel safe, comfortable and normal and all other men that you thought you loved including the red-haired guy who you pledged undying devotion to months ago pale in comparison to this guy. And as you’re lying in bed in the wee hours of the morning unable to sleep you start to cry because you realize that the twenty minute conversation with the guy was like talking to your twin and you never thought you’d ever meet your twin nor did you ever believe in the twin concept until now. That talking to the customer service rep was like glimpsing a piece of heaven, heaven on earth that every girl dreams about when you meet the right guy. And you spill more tears because you realize how your ex-husband shattered the Mr. Perfect dream when you divorced and you’ve stayed away from guys like him ever since, even though guys like him are the ones you really, really like. And still more tears leave your eyes because you realize that once you’ve experienced a bit of heaven you can never go back and that maybe you never really loved the dozen or so men you thought you loved. And your last waking thought as you are finally falling asleep and the one that really breaks your heart is the right relationship is like having a piece of heaven on earth and the wrong relationship isn’t bad but it so pales compares in comparison to the real thing but you didn’t know it because your ex-husband spoiled it all for you and that it took a twenty minute conversation with a customer service rep who lives in Laguna Beach to set you straight.

And just to set the record straight, I did make myself go and see "Revenge of the Sith" again last Friday. And yes, I did cry at some point when "Ani" descends. I think the saddest part was when Padme tries to tell Obewon that "Ani still has good left in him" but dies before finishing the sentence. And then when Darth Vader asks about Padme, that was sad in a way because it showed he really did still care for her even though he tried to kill her before.

Oh yeah, and younglings about to die, that was sad. After the movie I started to think that maybe love was bad and a path to the dark side, because I'm still depressed, but then I realized that it's not love that's bad, its attachment that's bad. Ani was too attached to Padme, and attachment is a path to the dark side and not love. When you're too attached to an outcome, you end up not doing good things sometimes. Attachment is tied into emotions, and intense emotions like fear and anger are direct paths to the dark side. But not love, at least not love without attachment to results. But who is divine enough to have that kind of love 24/7. I think that's the tragedy of Anakin Skywalker. He was all too human and couldn't rise above the level of emotional attachmnents. Plus having intuitions about a bad future coming to pass probably doesn't help.

I love that my intuitions are coming true, but at the same time, it's kind of a pain because there are things that I sense that I don't want to come true. And with my schizophrenic intuitions I don't know which ones are true and which ones aren't, so half the time I'm like thinking "what is the point of having intuition if it's not completely reliable?"

Work has really been tough too. There are some weird political things happening at work, and I don't like it. The guy who I didn't like and thought was going to quit, quit on Tuesday. My intuition on that guy totally came true and that was kind of scary. I never liked the guy and as of March I knew the guy was going to quit.

Of course I was shocked when he did because my intuition is schizophrenic at times, but my prediction did come true. The guy quit because he didn't get along with the woman I have problems with, who is like the senior manager in our department. I don't blame him. The woman is like an insecure junior high cheerleader terrorist who is not very smart, but works very hard at trying to please and kiss ass her bosses, and those types in corporate America tend to do very well. But she is like so disorganized. She's a good project manager, but she's so scattered. She thinks she's smart but she's really not, and it really shows sometimes. Plus she's the type who has to be right about everything and if you do like I did and be stupid enough to challenge her, you're on her shit list forever.

I think the woman positively hates and the feeling is mutual. The problem is she's my boss's boss. I try to steer clear away from her, but it's hard. The woman hates me so much, she never invites me to any meetings that I should probably be attending and someone from another department asked why she never copies me on email that I should be getting. I wanted to tell him it's because she's a vindictive immature bitch, but I just said "I don't know". This guy is new and he's always commenting to me on how scattered this woman is. I always want to agree with him, but I know if I do and she finds out about it, she'll make my work life more of a hell than it already is.

I think my boss knows and I can't stand her, and tries to make sure I'm not involved in projects with her but it's hard. My intuition is telling me that she won't be around in August because of some other political stuff going on at work and I hope my intuition is right.

The woman has three kids and only is in the office two days a week, and works from home three days a week. My company just laid down a policy that if you have direct reports, starting on August 1, you have to be in the office five days a week. The woman I can't stand is trying to get an exemption, but I don't she'll get one. I know the guy who is quiting is the vindictive type and he'll like totally blast her in his HR exit interview. She's already had three employees quit who worked directly for her in the year I've worked there, and all for the same reason - because she's hard to get along with and very disorganized.

That's the thing I've learnt in my experience in corporate america, no one is indispensible. You think you are but you're not. And not especially at my company where they've let go at one senior executive a month since December. My boss's boss might think she's indispensible but the VP for our division axed his right hand man two months ago. Now if he can do that, I don't think he'll have any problem getting rid of other people. But I'll have to see.

Yes, I'm still around but I haven't felt much like posting or writing for that matter. I took a seminar in Monterey on Saturday June 11 called "Creating the Love of your Life", and I'm like so depressed now. I took it with a friend of mine and she's depressed as well.

It's kind of like I feel so let down. Like, I created this huge list of what I want in a relationship and I think I'm depressed because I don't think I'll ever find this guy. Never mind that the womwan who created the seminar has an 85% success rate and that the woman who recommended the seminar to me is now married to a guy who she says fulfills 95% of the things she wanted in a guy and in a relationship, I'm like so what. Maybe that can happen to them but not to me. I think I'm just detoxing from all my issues about love and relationships.

Of course, silly me decided after Monterey to go and see "Revenge of the Sith" on Sunday. That was a mistake. I couldn't get my butt in gear so I ended up on Muni at the last possible second thinking I have half an hour to get downtown. But as luck would have it, stupid Muni train breaks down so I miss the first 10 minutes of the movie.

And I was so not in the mood to watch "Ani" descend into the dark side, that I just walked out of the theatre in a daze. Then I decided I needed to a friend's housewarming party in the Haight, which of course was happening during the middle of the Haight Street Fair.

What a zoo that fair is! There were no good bands, and just a bunch of wannabee hippie types milling around. My last experiene of the Haight Street Fair was years ago when I happened upon it and there was this fantastic blues band playing at 10 am. I was my usual dancing self and dancing right in front of the band, and was ignoring the band guy who kept gesturing for me to get up on the stage and dance. The music was great and I wasn't about the join the rest of the flower chicks trying to dance on stage.

But it was great to see my friend since I hadn't seen in her in weeks and wouldn't be seeing her all summer since she's off to Costa Rica and then New Jersey for the summer. But after about 1.5 hours I was dead. I just wanted to go home and process my seminar and lie in bed and wait for depression to come.

Check the article out below ... it's pretty revolutionary but scary.

FDA panel to consider approval of race-specific heart failure drug

An FDA panel this Thursday will consider whether NitroMed’s BiDil, a drug found to significantly improve survival among African-American patients with moderate to advanced heart failure, should become the first drug intended for use by a specific racial group, the New York Times reports. After being rejected for general approval in 1997 because of “inconclusive evidence” in clinical trials, BiDil in 2004 was called one of the year’s “top developments” by the American Heart Association after a study of 1,050 African-American heart failure patients found that the drug “significantly reduced death and hospitalization” by widening participants’ blood vessels. Industry analysts say that if BiDil is approved, NitroMed will be able to use the drug’s “racially specific indication” to extend patent protection by an additional 13 years; they add that the drug’s annual sales have the potential to reach $825 million. However, although NitroMed maintains that its decision to test the drug solely in African Americans is based on “solid science,” some medical ethicists and scientists worry that “race is too broad and ill-defined a category to be relevant in determining a drug’s approval.” For instance, a researcher who last year reviewed BiDil in the Yale Journal of Health Policy, Law, and Ethics said that the drug’s approval as an African-American-only drug “would give an official ring to the discredited idea that race is a biological category.” In addition, many physicians contend that BiDil may also work in patients of other ethnicities and say that tests are needed to determine whether the drug is more effective in African-American patients. The Times notes that if the FDA panel recommends approval of BiDil, it would “go well beyond where it has in the past in using race as a category to evaluate which patients respond to drugs” (Saul, Times, 6/13; Daily Briefing, 11/9/04). For more information about the results of the trial investigating BiDil in African-American heart failure patients and the debate about ethnically targeted therapies, please see the Nov., 18, 2004 Cardiovascular Watch.
*****

So I'm like thinking if they have the technology to make racial specific therapy drugs, doesn't this also mean they have the technology to make racial specific biological weapons or disease as well?

The conspiracy theorist in me is coming out!

I'm starting to become interested in what jury will say about Michael Jackson. The legal pundits have said that if the jury deliberates for this long, then it's not good news for Jackson. I'm starting to think they're right.

I stayed at this amazing hotel in Vancouver years ago, and for the life of me I couldn't remember the name of it. I was searching for another hotel today that I'm attending a seminar at tonight, and when I googled the hotel website I noticed they had a hotel in Vancouver. When I clicked on the Vancouver hotel, I saw the hotel I stayed at all those years ago.

Check it out - Pan Pacific Hotel - Vancouver. We had a great view of the bay, and I loved that the hotel looked like a yaht. Vancouver is such a great city to visit ... it's so clean and very, very beautiful.

I woke up this morning feeling good for the first time in a very long time. I was having a small health issue but it resolved itself this morning, and I’m starting to wonder if I was more than a little worried about what was happening.

I’m going to see the great Robert McKee on Thursday night, screenwriting guru made famous in the movie “Adaptation”. McKee is hosting his famous seminar in San Francisco this weekend and I would have signed up, but I have plans for both days. The seminar in pricey anyway, and it’s just not in my budget to spend that much money right now.

What else? I saw a Japanese adaptation of Shakespeare’s “Comedy of Errors” called “The Kyogen of Errors” on Thursday June 2. Kyogen is a type of Japanese theater. Below is an explanation I found on the Net on what Kyogen is:

Kyogen evolved from a form of indigenous theater called Sarugaku and reached the level of popular entertainment among the common people during the tumultuous Muromachi Period (1380-1466). During the Tokugawa Period, kyogen subsequently gained the acceptance and support of the ruling classes. At this time, for aesthetic reasons, it was paired with noh. While noh and kyogen are performed on the same stage, and there is a part for a kyogen actor in almost every noh play, they are two separate theater arts. Kyogen dialogue is a somewhat stylized form of the common spoken language of the Muromachi Period while the language employed in the noh theater is highly literary in style. While noh is historical and tragic, kyogen plays reflect the habits, customs and lives of ordinary people in short comic sketches. Short ballads (kouta) were popular among the common people in the Muromachi period, and a number of these songs appear in kyogen plays. Kyogen relied heavily on improvisation and it was not until the seventeenth century during the Edo Period that the oldest still extant plays were put into written form. Once many manuscripts of these plays had come into existence, there was a tendency not to expand the repertoire and there were also no substantial changes in the way the plays were performed. Kyogen plays are divided into several categories, depending on the type of character designated as protagonist (shite) or the overall theme of the play. Today some 300 kyogen plays are known and about 200 of them are still performed, but unlike noh, not even a single name is left to us of those who composed kyogen.

The performers wore these masks and they looked like cute little goblins on stage. They kept uttering this phrase throughout the whole play “ya ya ko shi ya”, which in Japanese means “It’s all very complicated”. The performers were all men, and two of men who were supposed to be imitating women wore the most beautiful kimonos. I saw this play at Shakespeare in Golden Gate Park a few years ago, and they used boy/girl twins in the role.

It was amazing how the performers were able to translate a Shakespeare play into a very old form of Japanese theater, and that as an audience member I could still recognize the play as what I remembered.

Here’s the Chronicle’s review - "Errors" does Shakespeare right.

I decided that I hate my job. I probably would have tried to leave last year if it wasn’t for that whole business with the red-haired guy. The people are nice, but the organization itself sucks since it’s so disorganized. I can see them heading into some rocky, rocky times this year now that the CEO is sending out emails about how we need to cut expenses.

I didn’t like my other job either, but I was so lucky to have a job when everyone else I knew was unemployed, that I managed to file away from discontent for four years. I have to figure out a way to file away my dissatisfaction with this new job like I did with my previous job. I know this is a good job for me financially, and my boss is great although sometimes just plain irritating. But the company is very dysfunctional and their disorganization is just too much for me to handle sometimes. I know my boss feels the same way because she told me last week that she didn’t know what we were doing.

My intuition is telling me to at least hold one through the summer because the company will going through some rough times, and that the rough times will initiate several changes culturally within the company. Until then, I’m going to have to figure out a way to feel content with my job. My discontent is at a zenith today, and I know this is a bad sign for me. I know it’s affecting my attitude at work and that’s not good.

I'm hoping this is just post too long holiday job satisfaction stuff, but I have a feeling it's not. I think this stuff has been building for a long time, and fortunately or unfortuntately, my roller coaster personal life has distracted me from facing how much I'm really not happy at work. Part of me wants to initiate another personal crisis just so I can stay at my job, but that would only delay things and not really solve them.

Sometimes I hate long weekends. Coming back to work today is such a big old drag. I don't want to be here, my boss is so irritating me, and I'm dreaming of getting out in any I can. Where's my sugardaddy? Like I'd never ever thought I'd ever want one, but you know I can see why some women would want one now.

I was sitting on my bed this afternoon between 2-3pm, and I felt a sharp jolt hit the building and then my bed. I kind of thought it was an earthquake, but wasn't sure because it was so short. I decided to check the USGS site, and sure enough there were two minor earthquakes around that time at the San Francisco Zoo.

Wow, what a trip. I felt something hard hit the building but I knew it had to be some minor earthquake because when I looked outside I didn't see anything. This is the second quake I've felt in two weeks. I hope this isn't a sign of things to come.

Just because I'm purchasing song like mad on iTunes doesn't mean I've stopped buying CDs. My latest CD purchases were:

The Crow Soundtrack - think I might have to get the DVD as well and put this movie in my top 10 list

October by U2 - the first U2 album I bought back in the day when they were just a no-name band from Ireland. Gloria is still one of their best songs, and an early prototype of a typical U2 anthem song.

So for whatever reason, I am hooked on flash drives. I love the 128 mb flash drive I bought with my Dell laptop. I just put my stick and transfer files back and forth.

I just bought a 1 gig mini cruzer by SanDisk on EBay. Everyone wants one, and it took me bidding on four different ones to get one for a price I wanted to pay.

iTunes is so addictive. I'm deciding whether I need to buy "No Tears" or "She is Mine" by the Pscychedelic Furs. I used to really, really love these songs!

My latest iTune purchases.

As Long As You're Mine by Idina Menzel & Leo Norbert Butz Wicked (Original Broadway Cast Recording)
I'm Not That Girl by Idina Menzel Wicked (Original Broadway Cast Recording)
I Can't Make You Love Me by Bonnie Raitt
My Happy Ending by Avril Lavigne
If You Asked Me To by Céline Dion
Do You Know Where You're Going To? (Theme from "Mahogany") by Diana Ross
Black Hole Sun by Soundgarden
South Side by Moby & Gwen Stefani
Crazy for This Girl by Evan & Jaron
Endless Love (Soundtrack Version) by Diana Ross & Lionel Richie
Iris by The Goo Goo Dolls
True by Ryan Cabrera
Addicted by Enrique Iglesias
Beautiful by Christina Aguilera
I Knew I Loved You by Savage Garden
Lullaby by Shawn Mullins
Love Plus One by Haircut 100
Bittersweet Symphony by The Verve
All I Want by Toad the Wet Sprocket
Inside Out by Eve 6
Right Here Waiting by Richard Marx
Angelia by Richard Marx
Ku'u Lei Maile by Uluwehi Guerrero
The Way You Move by OutKast & Sleepy Brown
My Ever Changing Moods by The Style Council

I'm thinking about music tonight. On the way home from my greek drama final as I'm driving along the beach I hear all these songs connected to men I've loved.

Wish you were here by Pink Floyd - Paul
Hit me with your best shot by Pat Benatar - Michael
How deep is your love by the BeeGees - Reid
Wouldn't it be nice by The Beach Boys - John

Then before class I started thinking about my top 10 cd list again, this time adding:
Butterfly by Mariah Carey
My Favorite Things by John Coltrane
Wish by The Cure
Symphony and Metallica
Kind of Blue by Miles Davis
What's the story morning glory by Oasis
Dirty Mind by Prince
Celebrity Skin by Hole
The Four Seasons by Vivaldi
Requieum by Mozart
The Crow Soundtrack

And now this is my favorite new song: Breathe (2am) by Anna Nal

2 Am and she calls me cause I'm still awake
Can you help me unravel my latest mistake
I don't love him and winter just wasn't my season.
Yea we walk through the doors so accusing their eyes
Like they have any right at all to criticize
Hypocrites you're all here for the very same reason.

Cause you can't jump the track
We're like cars on a cable and life's like an hourglass glued to the table,
No one can find the rewind button girl
So just cradle your head in your hands.
And breathe, just breathe, whoa breathe just breathe

May he turned 21 on the base of Fort Bliss
Just today he sat down to the flask in his fist
Ain't been sober since maybe October of last year
Here in town you can tell he's been down for while
But my God it's so beautiful when the boy smiles
Wanna hold him but maybe I'll just sing about it

Cause you can't jump the track
We're like cars on a cable
And life's like an hourglass glued to the table,
No one can find the rewind button boys so cradle your head in your hands
And breathe, just breathe, whoa breath just breathe

There's a light at the end of this tunnel you shout cause you're just as far in as you'll ever be out
And these mistakes you've made
You'll just make them again if you'll only try turnin' around

2Am and I'm still awake writing this song
If i get it all down on paper it's no lonmger inside of me threaten' the life it belongs to.
And I feel like I'm naked in front of the crowd
Cause these words are my diary screamin' out aloud
And I know that you'll use them however you want to.

But you can't jump the track
We're like cars on a cable
And life's like an hourglass glued to the table,
No one can find the rewind button now
Sing it if you understand...yeah breathe
Just breathe, ohho breathe.

I think my pc needs some serious upgrading. Last night I turned on my computer on to work on my greek drama paper, and the fonts were all messed up. I called a friend of mine who use to be a Help Deck techie at a company we both worked at, and she suggested after having tried many things that I copy the fonts in my font directory on my laptop to my pc. This solved the problem.

Somehow the fonts in my font directory were wiped out because when we looked in there, they were all gone. What a scary, scary thing to happen, but thankfully we fixed it. I just thank god I have my laptop as a backup. I don’t why it took so long for me to buy one, because I use it quite a bit and I love watching TV and writing on my laptop. I can watch TV and write at the same time, which is only difficult if I get involved watching a program. I like to have the television on for background noise when I write, and when I get bored I can always look up and start watching whatever is on.

I definitely have to upgrade the chip memory on my pc, because it’s a 256-chip and it’s very, very slow. After that I need to put all my important files on a cd, so I can upgrade to Windows XP professional. I finally have my upgrade copy. Last night’s computer scare reminded me that I have gotten very lax in backing up my pc. I should really just buy one of those giant memory sticks that have a gig of memory and back it up to there once a week. All I really care about are my Microsoft Office files like words, excel, ppts, etc, my pdfs, my mail files, and my palm pilot files. Everything else can be reinstalled.

But if I do upgrade from Windows 2000, I think I need to clear out all the garbage out of my pc. I have mail messages in Outlook from 1998 that I’m still keeping. I think I should also keep all my important docs in a few directories, just so it’s easier to back up. This kind of stuff is such a chore, but very necessary if I want to upgrade my pc. I guess this will be my Memorial Day project this weekend.

I rented the movie "I Robot" and I think I might have to get the DVD. Not that the movie is that good, but the comnentary by director Alex Proyas and Akiva Goldsman is so fantastic. They actually tell you what when went into the writing of the movie, and as a lesson in how to write a screenplay it's very informative.

I think it's the best commentary I've ever heard on a movie. Usually they are so boring, but this one is very, very good. Akiva Goldsman wrote "A Beautiful Mind" and I think was also brought in to write "The Da Vinci Code". I have a book where he's quoted and he said he attended Robert McKee screenwriting seminar and after that, sold his first screenplay. Funny huh? Just like the guy in the movie "Adaptation".

The weekend of June 11 has three seminars that I badly want to take. I'm already paid for a seminar called "Creating the love relationship" that you want, which has an 85% success rate. I met a woman who met her husband shortly after she took the seminar and she said he was 95% of what she wrote up she wanted in the seminar.

Robert McKee is also doing his three day "Story" seminar that weekend here in San Francisco, a location that he rarely uses. Then there's a seminar on that new energy psychology technique I discovered called "EFT". If you''re not into energy psychology, it's like the latest and greatest new thing. I took a 3-hour seminar on EFT in April, but couldn't stay for the whole thing.

So I'm like love, screenwriting or emotional freedom ... hmmmmmm. I'm already registered for the love seminar and they've already cashed my check. But Robert McKee, I mean when is he ever going to be in San Francisco. And EFT, who doesn't want emotional freedom.

But ... I guess love wins out every time. 85% success rate ... that's an amazing stat for a seminar on how to find your perfect love. And 95%. I don't think I've gotten more than 50% of what I've wanted in a relationship. I know you can't have 100%, but I didn't think you get 95%. I thought it was more like 50% and up to 75% if you were really, really lucky. But 95% .... that's like a frickin' miracle!

I finally finished my paper and it ended up being 8.5 pages. I'll read it tomorrow on the way to work and edit it, and make any changes tomorrow night. It's not the best paper, but at least it's over with.

It's a beautiful and warm sunny weekend in San Francisco, and I'm stuck inside finishing my greek drama paper and studying for my greek drama final on Tuesday. My screenwriting teacher on Wednesday asked me if I was still taking classes, and when I said yes she said, "That's why you can't find time to write."

I think Julie is right. I probably won't take a class next fall, and I'm definitely not taking a class this summer. I don't mind taking one day or evening seminars, but not a full month three month commitment. I told Julie I wanted to take a film class and she said to take the two-day film school class they offer at Learning Annex. She said it was just as good.

I really do want the experience of making my own film just to check it out, and a two day commitment is definitely better than a semester commitment of two days a week.

Just to relieve the boredom of studying, I typed of three pages of my "Changing Timelines" novel. That's 800 words, not bad I guess. I was changing my story while writing it then decided to go back to the way it was originally written, since I was going to have to cut a whole page out. I hate when you change one action and then find out after ten minutes that you've eliminated a whole scene with the one change. I hate that! I'll change the scene in the second rewrite.

God I hate studying! I do. It's so boring. I could be out and about gallivanting around and enjoying the day. Actually I'm feeling bette than I thought I would be this weekend, considering I had two filling replaced on Saturday morning. Everytime I have dental work, my mouth hurts for days but this new dentist I'm seeing is gentle with his injections.

I had a silver filling replaced with a composite, and I'm having an onlay put it on my other filling. My other dentist only every did crowns, but this new dentists can do onlays. If I have enough money left in my flex spending, I might have him later on in the year replace more my mercury fillings with composites.

It looks a nice day out and I may go out later to walk in the park, but there's more studying to do and I still have to finish my paper. I'm feeling very sorry for myself right now.

On Wednesday, I volunteered to sit on a screenwriting pitch panel at The Academy of Art College. My screenwriting teacher teaches a couple of classes there and she asks her ex-students every semester to help her out. When you sit on pitch panel, you learn a lot about how to actually deliver a pitch so it’s good training.

The guy who sat on my pitch panel with me actually got his screenplay optioned on a pitch panel. He went to some pitch panel in Hollywood, pitched his movie about a dozen times, and got a call from a couple of young producers. The young producers works for the guy who just produced Jet Li’s newest film “Unleashed”.

So my pitch panel buddy has optioned his screenplay, but said the Hollywood lawyers’ fees ate up most of it. He wanted to have a professional contract in case his script is ever made into a movie. And now he’s do rewrites for free with the young producers and he said the process is going really, really well.

Interesting huh? My pitch panel buddy said this is his sixth screenplay, and when he told me his idea I was even impressed. His screenplay is very topical and is a thriller having to do with GPS technology. It kind of reminded me of GPS technology “Panic Room” type movie, low budget but very, very exciting.

I was really happy for him, and I was like wow, someone I know actually got his screenplay bought by Hollywood. Okay, maybe not for very much money since options I hear start as low as $35,000, but still he got paid for his work. Pitch panel buddy guy didn’t want to say how much he got, but he said it wasn’t much. But if his script get made into a movie, he said his Hollywood lawyer got him a really, really good deal. He better have gotten a good deal since he said the lawyer spent 1.5 months with the producers trying to hammer out a contract.

And then I started to get depressed. Okay, maybe I got depressed because afterwards we went to the W hotel for drinks and sat on the couches in the lobby and I watched couples grope each other as they we were waiting for the lift and I was like “I want to be groped in the lobby of a nice hotel by some guy waiting for the lift and a night of some majorly serious shagging”. Okay, maybe not any guy and for god’s sake not the old wrinkly 60 year old dude who looked like he was wearing a dark brown shag rug on his heard and who was feeling up the 20 something girl, but some cute guy who was very smart an very sweet.

But no, I think I got depressed thinking I’ll never be a writer who makes a living as a writer. I mean, what are the chances of that ever happening. Sure I can get paid, but not enough to quit my job and have as my next career – creative writer. And I’m like maybe my writing is just a hobby that I have and then I don’t have to stress about ever finishing anything. I can just start projects and never finish and not worry. But that’s an even more depressing thought isn’t it?

I’m getting too involved in work again, and I hate it. Work just sucks out my creative energy, and when I get home I’m too wired and exhausted to do anything.

Somehow I got back on meeting schedule hell, where I’m in meetings constantly. I managed to get myself taken off all the meeting lists by not saying anything in meetings last year, but now I’m suddenly back on everyone’s lists. I hate it!

On Tuesday, I came into the office by 7:30 am so I could be prepared for a conference call from 8-9 am. Then I was supposed to be in another meeting from 9:30-10 am, but thankfully it got cancelled. But then at 10 am, I was pulled into a four-hour meeting from 10am-2pm, and afterwards I was pulled into yet another meeting to debrief about the four-hour meeting from 3-4 pm.

Since I came in early, I decided to leave at 4:15 pm because I was so mentally exhausted by the end of the day. But my day still hadn’t ended since I had a class from 7-10 pm that night. By the time I finally got home at 10:30 pm, I was so wired and out of sorts that I made myself go to bed. Not that going to bed early helped, because I was tossing and turning and had weird dreams all night.

I hate meetings! My company’s dysfunctional nature comes out in full force in large meetings, and especially in meeting debriefs. I hate when people say “that’s not our problem”, because I’m like, yes it is, we’re all in this together; if you let that department sink and slack off then we’ll never get this project off the ground. I actually told someone yesterday because I was so frustrated “how are we supposed to make it easier for the consumer to do business with us if we there’s no easy way to get business done internally”. The person looked at me like I was completely nuts, but I’m a big believe in “as above so below”. If your business processes internally aren’t easy, you’re never going to be able to make it easy for your external customers to do business with your company. It just ain’t every going to happen.

But I won’t get myself get worked up in my company’s dysfunctionality and politics. I’ve done that before, and it’s just too tiring to fight battles in the corporate world. It’s much easier to just go with the flow and do what you’re told to do without questions, because every time I’ve done that I’ve been promoted. Not that I want to get promoted or anything like that, although more money is always nice, but I just want to make my work life peaceful again so I can have the energy to have a creative life when I get home.

I must be processing a ton at night in my dreams because I'm having the weirdest, weirdest dreams.

On Monday I dreamt I was with a woman I used to know and we were in parking structure and trying to escape with two other women. We had sub-automatic machine guns were carrying belts of ammo. The woman I used to know who appeared in my dream is someone I used to admire very greatly. She was a doctor and dedicated runner, and the nicest person. I lost touch with her years ago so it was weird for her to appear in a dream of mine. She was a tough cookie of a girl, but very fair minded.

Around 3 am last night before I woke up, I dreamt that my best friend from grade school had brought me a birthday cake was singing Happy Birthday to me. This is a girl who moved away in junior high and although we went to the same high school, she and I moved in separate crowds and didn't have much to do with each other. Why the woman was in my dream when I haven't thought about in years probably is a mystery. She said she had forgotten all my birtdays and wanted to make up for it. Weird, weird, weird!

Later this morning before my alarm went off, I dreamt I was at a Starfbombs in Paris and they had run out of milk for my grande latte. The american owner told me that the french don't put milk in their coffe so they weren't bothered that they were out of milk. I was upset and I started arguing with the woman, but I didn't lose my temper. And then later on in the dream I came back to apologize.

Then in another part of the dream, I was somewhere on the British railway system on a train with a bunch of people trying to get to London so we could make in time for the London showing of "Revenge of the Sith". We pulled into some station and I heard the announcer mention that it was a transfer point for all these stations including the Gatwick Airport. I couldn't remember where we were supposed to transfer to get to Heathrow, and when I turned my friend were gone.

I assumed they had gotten off the train, but when I exited the train I couldn't see them. In the dream I was panicking and thinking I'll miss the new Stars Wars movie, I won't make it to Heathrow and I'll be lost forever on the British Railway system.

I wouldn't consider the being lost dream a nightmare, but more like annoyances in my life that I absolutely hate; no lattes and not knowing where I'm going and getting lost.

This greek drama paper is going to harder to write than I thought. It's supposed to be due tomorrow, but my teacher said we could also turn it in next week when we have the final.

I mean, I know what I want to say but do I want to spend the next four hours trying to write it or do I write a littel bit every day and turn it in next week. Ideally, I'd like to turn my paper in tomorrow and then spend the rest of the week studying for the final but I just don't feel like I have the energy right now to write a good paper. I feel so lazy right now!

Maybe I posted this already, I can't remember but here's a short two page paper I wrote on a sermon by Bernard of Clairvaux (1090 – 1153) "Father of Western Mysticism" and a christian saint canon by Pope Alexander III in 1174.

Bernard of Clairvaux (1090 – 1153)
Sermon: On David and Goliath

Biblical Text

Then he took his staff in his hand, and chose five smooth stones from the wadi, and put them in his shepherd’s bag, in the pouch; his sling was in his hand, and he drew nearer to the Philistine. (NRSV, 1 Samuel 17:40)

What the biblical text says
The book of 1 Samuel is a historical narrative, which shows the changes taking place in the leadership of Israel from the Judges to the monarchy of Saul and David, and the establishment of the House of David dynasty.

I believe the text is straightforward, and tells us that David chose weapons that he was used to carrying as a shepherd to do battle with Goliath.

Stones were plentiful in the area, and small stones were used in a sling as a long-range weapon.

What Bernard of Clairvaux says
Clairvaux says “the law is spiritual and has been written for our learning, not only to delight us with a history of external events as with the contemplation of a beautiful exterior surface, but also and more particularly to nourish our minds with the sweetness of its mystical signification”.

Clairvaux uses an allegory and preaches on the mystical meaning of each element in the David and Goliath story.

Goliath is meant to symbolize sin, and Clairvaux says that Goliath is the sin of a type of pride. Since Goliath was the Philistine’s greatest warrior, Clairvaux makes the case that Goliath represent pride. For Clairvaux, pride is the greatest of sins, the people of God are very prone to pride, and pride shows up when all other sins have been defeated.

Clairvaux assumes that we are in always in constant battle and warfare against sin, and that like David we must defeat Goliath, the sin of pride.

Clairvaux then goes on to talk about what happened earlier in the story, when Saul offered David his armor and weapons. He likens Saul’s battle gear to worldly wisdom and the tradition of philosophers, and he says that these are useless weapons in our battle against sin.

Clairvaux states that we should reject worldly wisdom and the tradition of philosophers, just as David rejected Saul’s armor and rely solely God and be armed with our faith alone.

Clairvaux then goes on to say that the five smooth stones that David picks up represent the “fivefold word of God”:
1) the word of warning,
2) the word of promise,
3) the word of charity,
4) the word of example,
5) the word which relates to prayer.

He then says when we are attacked by the sin of pride, we should use the five stones or “fivefold word of God” to defeat sin, to defeat pride, in whatever order they come to us, and if one stone fails to keep using them until one of them works.

When we are confronted with pride we should think of 1) the word of warnings which are the threats from God; or 2) the word of promise which are God’s promise and covenant with us; or 3) the word of charity or God’s loving actions towards us; or 4) the word of example which means to reflect on the lives of the saints; and if all fails, 5) the word which relates to prayer, in other words, “apply thyself to prayer with all the fervour that canst command.”

Clairvaux concludes by saying that if we want to kill Goliath, the sin of pride with it own sword as did David, we need to create a “feeling of elation” in our minds and “a reason for greater humility”, so we can condemn ourselves as proud people and become afterwards more humble and less conceited. If we can do that, Goliath, the sin of pride will be defeated.

Was the Word faithfully preached?
As much as I like this sermon for its creative attempt to make the historical biblical text more meaningful, I do not believe that you can assign the kind of symbolism to the five stones that Clairvaux has done. There is nothing in the Bible to support such a claim, and while his advice is eminently practical on what to do when facing sin, Clairvaux’s allegory fails when you try to relate the word stone to “fivefold promise of God”.

If you wanted to really stretch it you could say, the word of warnings come from stone used as weapons, the word of promise comes from the Ten Commandments being printed on stone tablets, and the word of charity could be God providing stones for housing. For the words of example and prayer, it becomes increasingly difficult to take the stone symbolism and apply them to charity and prayer without sounding like you’re making it all up.

This is why I have to stop taking classes. Instead of working on finishing my novel, I have to spend tonight writintg an 8-10 page paper for my greek drama class.

I'm comparing Eugene O'Neill's trilogy play "Mourning Becomes Electra" to Aeschylus' Oresteia. I picked the paper topic so it's something I want to write about, but this kind of writing is sooo not creative writing!

So I've spent about an hour looking for a scene from my "Changing Timelines" novel that I thought I had typed out. I looked on my palm and on my computer and it was gone. I was so pissed thinking I had accidentally deleted it. But then I decided to check my pile of handwritten writing and it was there.

I thought I had typed that whole story and I guess sometime in January, I decided to for a few days to write some of it out. I was so happy because I hate when I delete stuff and I've done it before and been severely bummed out.

I managed to type 866 words on Thursday for chapter 12 of my Texas novel on Thursday at the Starfbombs across from The Curran Theatre. My goal was to type 500 words as I only had 45 minute, but I got to 866. And it's a good 866 too. It wasn't all painful coming, but very easy and fluid once I started typing.

I dragged my laptop to work and made the mistake of carrying it in my backpack. Big mistake. Stupid backpack wouldn't fit underneath my chair at the theatre, so I had sit all squished in my seat with my backpack between my legs.

My boss has this great Tumi bag that she carries her laptop in when she comes for the day from the LA. It's the perfect size because it's small and looks like it fits about anywhere. It costs about $300 when I went to price it at the Tumi store, but that's a minor detail I guess. I might have to buy it someday if I don't find a cheaper alternative to carrying my laptop around.

I watched Eugene O'Neill's play "A Moon for the Misbegotten" on Thursday night. It's such a great play, but towards the end when there was this intense speech where the character is pouring his guts out on stage, some guy starts snoring and cellphone of the man sitting next to me goes off. I wanted to laugh out out and add further to the hilarity of the moment. Talk about a play for the misbegotten.

I think someone nudged the snoring guy finally because after a couple of minutes he stopped. I can imagine what the actor must have thought if he had actually heard the person snoring in the midst of this intense speech.

We used to say in the growth and development seminars I usd to go to, that when a person falls asleep it's because they can't handle the information that they're listening to so their brain has to immediately shut off and the person goes to sleep. Guess the snoring person couldn't handle a drunken character telling another character why he thinks he's messed up.

It was hard to watch myself since I dated someone who was a bit like that and had to experience the same thing one night a long time ago. Some people drink for fun, some people drink to escape and there's a fine line between the two before you cross the top of the bell curve into addiction.

Actualy there's a scene from David Lynch's "The Straight Story" that shows a character telling another character why he drinks. It's the most honest depiction of casual alcoholism I've seen in a movie. It's straight talk and frightening in its honesty and humanity.

This is trippy! I just got a call from a recruiter who got my name and phone number out of a publication called National Managed Care Leadership Directory. I didn’t even know about the publication or that my name was even in it.

I've been using Microsoft Excel for years so one would think I could easily come up with this simple little IF formula -

=IF(ISTEXT(B10),"NA",IF(B10>AQ$9,"Abv CA Avg", IF B10=AQ$9,
"Eql CA Avg",IF B10 < AQ$9,"Blw CA Avg"))))

But ... the above formula took me over two hours to figure out and to get it to do what I wanted it to do. I hate when applications make me feel stupid.

Back to a more pleasant topic. I saw "Sahara" on Saturday. I knew it was a special effects movie and I wanted to see it on the big screen. I liked it. I think the movie took itself a little seriously, and if it didn't it would have made for a better movie. It was so darned politically correct, which of course made it a little boring.

I think the movie was supposed to be like another Indiana Jones, but Indiana Jones was not politically correct and it never took itself very seriously and that's what made the movie so fun and entertaining. And yes, Matthew M is cute but he's no Harrison Ford. Indy had a cruel streak, I mean come on, the guy had a whip for god's sake. Dirk Pitt is too much of doogooder type character, and yes that's attractive but it's an adventure story and you need an adventure type guy. Matthew M is too much of a goofy good ole boy, without a hint of meanness in him.

I think Matthew M's best role was in the movie "Contact". He was the wild-eyed hippie type philosopher who was Bill Clinton's religious advisor, and Jody Foster's fling from her C-seti days. But I think Matthew M is trying to change his Hollywood image and getting himself cast as Mr. Adventure, which he is so not. He wasn't very good as a swashbuckling dragon killer in the firebreathing dragon movie either.

Still the movie was fun and definitely worth the $7.25 I paid to see it. I wished I'd gone to see Nicholas Cage in "National Treasure". I think Nick Cage makes a better Mr. Adventure type, and he's definitely shown he's got a mean streak. He was great in that movie where he changed faces with John Travolta called "Face Off".

I'm on the last chapter of my Texas novel and I'm having the hardest time finishing it. I know how it's going to end because I wrote a four page outline of what the chapter is about, but it's feeling so anticlimactic to be writing this last chapter. I'm like, this is the first novel that I am finishing and it's like the freakiest feeling. I didn't think I would feel this way.

I thought I would feel elated and ecstatic to be writing the last chapter of my novel. Although it's not exactly the last chapter because I have two more chapters to write, but those last two chapters are epilogues. Chapter 12 is the final ending. Chapter 12 is the end of the story.

My intuition is telling me to take this week slow and to not push my writing. I want to finish the chapter this week, but I'm not going to rush it.

I think my problem is I'm going to have to end the relationship for my characters and it's sad. I'm not writing a happy ending, I'm writing a bittersweet ending. I wanted to write a fun love story with a sappy happy ending, and instead I'm writing a love story where the characters breakup.

I feel like I'm reliving the ending of the relationship I had with the person I based my male character on, and I don't want to go through the pain again. Silly isn't it? When I originally conceived of the story, I wanted to experience a fairytale happy ending with my male character. In real life the guy and I broke up, so I thought wouldn't it be fun to write a story with a similar male character except that we end up together.

But my ending didn't work out that way, my characters didn't want a happy ending. Yes I think they fell in love, but they were never meant to be just like me and that guy were never went to be. Just writing that line makes me feel like crying.

It's not like I didn't try my damndest to end my story happily, because I did. But my storyline couldn't justify a happy ending. I hate this! I write to experience things that I didn't experience in real life, and I end up writing a story that's closer to reality. This is supposed to be fiction and not my real life.

I know I'm being silly because these characters aren't me and they had situations happen to them that never happened to me. I just wish I could give them a better ending to their relationship than the one I had.

Sometimes my intuition kicks in and send me warnings about people that they're untrustworhty. I never know what to think when I get these feelings especially when I have no factual evidence to base my intuition on. But I think I need to start paying attention to those warnings.

There's this guy at work. I've never liked him, and I couldn't figure out why and I just had the feeling that he couldn't be trusted. The feelings I received were confusing because everyone else in the department really liked him.

Today my boss told me to watch out for him because he's the biggest gossip, and he's already tried to get several people in trouble. I told her I thought he was bad news when I first met him, but I didn't want to say anything. My boss said she got the same feeling too. My boss told me to watch what I say around him and to watch my back. She wouldn't elaborate on the people the guy has tried to mess up, but there's been quite a few.

What a freak! I know the guy thinks I'm snobby because I never talk to him but now I don't care. If I don't instinctively trust someone, I can't talk to them, I just can't, especially at work. I'm not rude or anything. I'm very civil, but I don't go out of my way to talk to an untrustworthy person at work. People of that ilk are just too dangerous, and who needs another person you have to be careful with in your work life; there are enough of those already.

So my intuition was right ... it usually is but it's kind of scary when it's confirmed the way my boss confirmed my intuition today.

I went to see "Kung Fu Hustle" tonight, and it was an "excellent, excellent" movie! I've got to kick a movie out of my top 10 list, so I can add Kung Fu Hustle. It's a fantastic spoof of the hong kong kung fu movie genre and steals from The Matrix, Gangs of New York, and as one review noticed Fred Astaire movies as well. There were some sequences that reminded me of my fave Bollywood movie "Lagaan" as well.

The movie is funny, fast paced, really really cute and sweet, and it has some of the best body parts hacked off nd flying all over the screen that I've seen in a long time. Gotta love a movie that has awesome violence in it! Plus of course, the kung fu is spectacular and puts the Matrix series to shame. And it doesn't take itself so seriously like "Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon", a movie where the fighting special effects were just a little too over the top and laughable really.

The movie was written and directd by Stephen Chow, who also wrote and directed "Shaolin Soccer" a movie I wanted to see but never got around to. Now I definitely have to see it and everything else he's written and directed.

"Kung Fu Hustle" is so fun I think I'm going to have to buy the DVD.

On iTunes there are celebrity playlists, and I can buy the Cure's playlist of 21 songs for about $21. I love all of their song picks, but then I adore the band so that makes sense doesn't it?

So I've finally joined the modern world and downloaded iTunes on my laptop and bought the following songs:

Collide by Howie Day
Breakaway by Kelly Clarkson (I hate that it's her but I like this song a ton!)
Breathe (2AM) by Anna Nalick
She Will Be Loved by Maroon 5
Where's Your Head At by Basement Jaxx
If You're Not the One by Daniel Bedingfield
Headstrong by Trapt
Beautiful by Pharrell, Snoop Dogg and Uncle Charlie Wilson
Mesmerize by Ja Rule
In da club by 50 Cent
Down with the sickness by Disturbed
Slept so long by Jay Gordon
Los Angeles is Burning by Bad Religion

So I think I figured out perhaps a few reasons why I can't write at my pct at home.

Back in 2002 while I was desperately trying to finish my screenplay to enter into a contest and watching the SF Giants and the Angels world series, my pc died. It took about two weeks to get someone to build me a new computer. Because I didn't back anything up, I had the pc guy install my old hard drives into my new computer.

When my computer died, I lost about a day's work on my screenplay and I believe some of my enthusiasm for writing. That was back in October 2002. I somehow managed to keep writing because I did Nanowrimo that year and started my second novel.

Then in May 2003 I moved, and I worked at home which was shocking and weird and made me not want to write. But I did manage to write and start my third novel, which I'm still trying to finish. Then in March 2004 I started a new job, which was again shocking and disruptive but I did try to write, only I wrote on paper at cafes and into my palm pilot.

And now that I have my new laptop, I'm thinking that my two year old computer is so slow and needs a new chip and if I replace the 256 memory chip with a 512 memory chip maybe I'll want to sit down and write at my pc again. Plus if I upgrade from windows 2000 to windows xp professional and uprgrade my software from office 2000 to office 2004, my home pc will run much faster which will make me want to actually sit down and use it.

I could probably just keep writing using my laptop, but it would be nice to have my home pc as another option. Or I could just buy one of them new macintosh pc computers, and own a mac like I've always fantasized about.

So here's some economic speculations I've been paying attention to the various boards I read. Experts have been speculating for a couple months now what would happen to GM and Ford if their bond status was rated as "junk". Many were speculating that GM would file for bankruptcy because it's been bleeding debt for years, and was only making money through GMAC. If GM were to declare bankruptcy, they could separate GM and GMAC into two companies. GM could also in bankruptcy courts unload the unions and all the costs of their retirees, which would be great for their bottom line but bad news for GM retirees, employees and the dozens of companies who have invested stock on GM including many large retirement funds. Experts have also warned that GM stock is a bellweather of the American economy, so if GM filed for bankruptcy it would not be a good sign for the US economy.

Well, it just happened. S&P cut GM's and Ford's bond status to "junk". It will be interesting what GM's next move will be. I say "bankruptcy" and if GM does that, it will be bigger than the Enron bankruptcy and the markets will take one hell of a dive on that day.

The movie "Angel Eyes" was on TV over the weekend, and I ended up watching the end of it. For fun, I printed out the screenplay to read as well. I didn't watch the beginning of the movie, so I netflixed it and it should be arriving soon.

The screenplay version I found on the Net was a little different than the movie, and when the movie comes I'm going to compare the lines to see how different they both are. It's interesting to watch a movie and then read the screenplay. And when you do the reverse, reading the screenplay first and then watching the movie, it's interesting as well. It's kind of like reading a novel first and then seeing how they make the movie or watching a movie first and then going back to read the book.

John Grisham's "The Firm" was a much better novel than the movie. The movie of
"The Girl with a Pearl Earring" was quite a good adaptation of the novel, and I think the visuals of Vermeer's world added a different element to the telling of the story.

The problem for me with reading screenplays is most of the screenplays that I can find on the Net and print are not necessarily movies that I like. But I guess I should get over this dislike, and just read whatever I can get my hands on. Everyone working in Hollywood as a screenwriter says that reading screenplays is the best way to educate yourself about the trade, and that watching a movie is not the same. I just wish there were more screenplays from movies that I liked that are free to print on the Net.

I am loving my new laptop. It has freed my from the tyranny of writing at my desk at home. Now that I used to mind writing from my desk at home because I did start two novels (over 100 pages of typed pages each), wrote over 20 short stories and finished a screenplay all at my desk. But for whatever reason, I can't write at my desk at home. I don't know if it's because I'm in a different place now and I just don't have my desk in the right place to write, or if it's because I just got burnt out from writing at home.

I wrote my mid-term paper on my laptop sitting on my bed and then transferred it to my pc to print. So it's not like I can't write at home, because I can. I just can't write at my desk at home. This is not a good thing for a writer, but with the laptop maybe it doesn't matter.

I'm even thinking it's now time to sign up for i-Tunes so I can download songs into my laptop. But I'm still hesitating. I still like the listening to music in cafes, because sometimes I hear songs that I wouldn't normally listen to and end up liking or I hear sets of songs that I wouldn't think go together but end up being a great set. I'm constantly surprised by the fantastic sets of music playing on the radio sometimes ... everything flows and there's a theme and the beats are the same so when one song ends the other song starts and it's same on the same beat. I've tried to do it and it's very difficult to get it just right. But it would be nice to have tunes on my laptop, so when a song gets stuck in my head I can listen to it a hundred times and write.

I was a conference call this morning with people involved in healthcare quality this morning, when someone mentioned blogs. The person was suggesting that maybe the group should start a blog to find out what consumers think about healthcare quality. No one on the call knew anything about blogs, and I was tempted to volunteer my knowledge but declined.

Apparently there was an article in the Wall Street Journal today about blogs and healthcare and how patients are discussing their doctors, and the doctors are of course very unhappy about it. Here it is, Blogging from your sickbed,

This is the first time the subject of blogs have come up in one of my nationwide conference calls on healthcare quality. What a riot!

My favourite new song that I keep hearing on the radio ... Collide by Howie Day.

Went to the cafe tonight and wrote about 1300 words. Not a lot but better than nothng. The writing in the morning thing is hard, so I'm going to switch to working out in the morning at 5 am. I'll make myself get used to getting that early b exercising, and then maybe I'll start trying to write early in the morning again. I really like writing at night though, and am so much more comfortable doing it at that time and in a cafe than I am sitting in bed and trying to compose in the morning.

If I workout in the morning, I have the whole night to write and do other things that needs to get done. Ideally, I'd love to write and workout in the morning, but I don't see that happening in the forseeable future anytime soon.

For whatever reason I got sucked into watching "Project Greenlight" on Sunday afternoon. I have a friend who's a theatre producer who is an avid fan. It's definitely eye-opening to see what it takes to write, produce and direct a movie in Hollywood.

It just confirms my idea that at the end of day, all creative arts is a business enterprise especially if you want to have a ton of people see it. If you're only making art for you and your friends, then you only have to take their needs into consideration. But if you want the masses to see it, then it takes cash and a heck of a lot of collaboration. And the logistics of making a movie are mind-boggling, especially if you want to do special effects. No wonder movie tickets are so expensive ... it takes so many people, and specialist people too, to put a movie together. I think if you want to see how much a move costs to make, then count how many people the movie has to pay when they run the credits at the end. All those people in the credits need to be be paid by the profits from a movie.

So maybe this is what you do when you're a wannabe writer. It's a Saturday night, and you're in bed polishing your half finished stage play that you wrote years ago but could just never seem to finish, and you're saying to yourself, this dialogue is really, really bad.

The Zatoichi movie over so I can go back to writing my blog. I started on Chapter 12 today and I wrote about 1,300 words. Then I went to library and I borrowed two more John Grisham books and another Michael Crichton book, that I think was made into a movie I saw.

I'm going have to figure out what to tell my friend about her screenplay. I really need to read more screenplays, so I can tell what's good and what's not good. Her characters are so stereotypical and there's no, how do you "oomph" to her story. It's not that her story isn't good, it is, the story is just a little trite and it's really not that original although she does have a good angle. It's not a Hollywood movie, but more of a movie like you'd see on the Lifetime channel.

Still I envy her because I know she worked hard on her screenplay, and I'm jealous that she completed another one. And you know I would love to write a movie for the Lifetime channel. I'm going to try to more tonight.

I just found out my screenwriting software can be used to write stage plays. I didn't know this, and I have a play that's been sitting around that needs finishing. I just thought of a new way to write it as I walking back home today too. There's so much to write and there's never enough time.

I got kind of depressed on Wednesday, well more than a little depressed, and depression definitely sucks away my creative energy. But even though I woke up depressed again this morning, I made myself get up and out of the house to write. And once I was sitting at Starfbombs drinking my venti latte, I was fine.

I guess I need to stop calling the place Starfbombs since I write there a lot. I even took my new laptop with me and was typing away. I'm definitely loving my new laptop, and I'm glad I'm using it alot.

I went to Starfbombs to read a friend's screenplay and write. My friend told me it was a Bridget Jones type screenplay, but it really wasn't. The writer of Bridget Jones wrote Bridget tongue in cheek, and it was always a take off on "Pride and Prejudice". Bridget was always supposed to end up with Mr. Darcy, despite her quirkiness and her fat. My friend got the fatness and quirkiness of Bridget right, but the story ended up being more of a stereotypical feminist rant about leaving a marriage where you're not treated right and claiming your singlehood, which Bridget Jones was never about. The character resembles more the "Nurse Betty" or Geena Davis' character and marriage in "Thelma and Louise".

I don't know, I just couldn't relate to the woman. But then again I have a hard time relating to female characters who don't have fun in the sack, because thank god bad and depressing sex has never been something I've experienced in a long term relationship. But that's just me I think. Sex has always been fun for me and if it wasn't, I wouldn't be in the relationship in the first place. But I know my attitude towards sex is a little different than the average girl's.

I'm trying to watch "Zatoichi 8", and it's hard to write to wach a movie that's subutitled and write at the same time. So more later.

I learned this new kind of therapy technique over the weekend, and it's bringing up all kind of stuff. You know, one would think that if you've been in and out of therapy since you were 21 years of age (and yes I've been in therapy that long) you would have solved alot of the big emotional issues in your life. Apparently this is not the case.

I have stuff coming up now about my parents that I had no idea was in my subconscious programming and this stuff is huge!!! This stuff has been lodged in my brain since I was six years old. You would think after having spent thousand and thousands of dollars on therapy and growth and development courses that this stuff would have come up. I mean, it's like so major and it explains patterns that I've noticed in my life since 1998. I hate that it's taken what, seven plus years for me to figure it out. That is like so slow!

I just made one connection last night, and then everything else fell in place. I'm like what else is in that black hole of my subconscious that is ruling my life. I feel like I'm in the matrix and I've created this messed up world, and I want to start over and recreate everything. But first, I have to keep digging through my subconsious programming. I'm afraid to know what else has been there.

Here's a new technique that I received in a newsletter today about money. Get a money bill in a large denomination and hold it and see what comes up in your mind about having it and whatever else you have going on about money. Or, hold your paycheck and see what issues you have about your career. Or, write a huge, huge check to yourself and see what comes up about money and worthiness.

The mind is a wild thing, and it's amazing what kind of interesting ideas are knocking around in there, that support and don't support you.

So I made the mistake of reading a John Grisham book "The Summons" that someone had given to me, and now I'm hooked on reading all of his stuff. Grisham's books are great bus-reads. You can go through a book in 2-3 days, and they are fast reads and very entertaining. I read the "The Firm" a long time ago but wasn't that intrigued by Grisham, but I guess I'm hooked now. That same friend also gave me Grisham's book "The Testament", so I'm plowing my way through it.

It's got some sad but hilarious sections on how people think about money. I know you're not supposed to say this as as writer, but I would love to write books like Grisham. I know as a writer you're supposed to want to write the next great american novel and not the next great beach/bus read, but what if you can't? What if my level of writing is on the level of the next great beach/bus read? I don't care, I'm not fussy ... I just want my stories published, and hopefully lots and lots of people will want to read my stuff. I would love to be the kind of writer that makes the reader unable to put novel down until they get to the end. That would be cool!

Up very early again trying to write. Wow, I'm finished with chapter 11 of my Texas novel. Three more chapters and I'll be done. Chapter 12 is a full chapter and chapters 13 and 14 are more lke epilogoues for each character.

Maybe there is something to this getting up at 5 am every morning thing. I'm awake and I can write. I'm tired and it's a little difficult, but that's because I'm not using to getting up at this hour. I'm amazed though how my brain is still quite functional at this early hour.

So it's after 5:30 am and I'm and in bed typing on my laptop and trying to write. I hate this! But the words are coming, which is nice. One thing that I noticed that I thought was impossible. My wireless network is working even though my main computer is powered off. I thought my main computer had to be on for me to pick up any internet connection. I guess not. Wow, this is new. I guess this means I can surf the net without me having to turn on my main computer. This is good.

I'm in bed and writing on my laptop. On Monday I finished typing up the handwritten pieces for Texas novel. I didn't write on Tuesday or Wednesday and didn't get up early to write either. It's still dark at 5 am and I just couldn't deal with it. I'm so lazy about getting out of bed. It has to stop though. Although I like writing after work, it's just too easy to skip it and do other things. I have to try writing in the morning again. Then I'll get it done and I won't have to worry about trying to fit it in with the rest of my day. I'm just so not a morning person, but I guess I'm going to have try and become one.

All the writing books says that you should write in the morning before you're critical mind has a chance to activate and nag you about how horrible you write. I think I owe it to my writing career to become a morning writer.

Before the money seminar last night, I did get an idea for a comedy screenplay about a woman who is a money seminar junkie. I got the idea from Ed Norton and Helena Bohnam-Carter in the movie "Fight Club", who were support group junkies. That was funny how they kept running into each other.

My character is a money-seminar junkie who is still in sad financial shape after many years, but who luckily gets an idea to start a business and it becomes a success. The plot follows her from klutzy financial ditz to Wall Street loved CEO, to her falling in love with a loser gigolo and then about to lose her company until her best friend, another money seminar junkie, comes to her resuce. And as in any good Hollywood romantic comedy, she falls in love with the guy best friend and gets back her company.

That's writing isn't it? I haven't had an idea for a screenplay that I've liked in a long time. It thihk this would be a fun one to write, once I get around to it.

Tonight I wrote 781 words for my Texas novel. It's not much, but it took to an hour to get it out even with me typing. Even if I just wrote 500-700 words a day, I would be done with novel sooner than the rate I'm writing it now.

I have the urge to get back to my baseball screenplay and to keep writing my timelines novel, but I'd like to fnish the Texas novel first because I'm so close to the end. It will be the first novel I've ever finished, and I think this accomplishment will be so amazing for me.

One thing in the money seminar that I got was that completion was very important. I have so many half finished stories. I need to just sit down and finish them even thoug they suck just to finish them. I think the energy of those completions will do wonder for my writing self-esteem. I still have two unfinished novels that I want to complete as well. There's just so many things to write and complete, but I'm having the hardest time finding the motivation to just sit down and write. I don't have blocks to writing, I have blocks to siting down and starting. How do you solve that problem easily?

I went to a seminar on money last night given by the Learning Annex, which I only attended because I received an email coupon to go to the seminar for only $20 when it would have normally cost $60. The seminar was actually quite good, and at one point the speaker asked the audience if any of us had made money in the last five years in California. No one raised their hand, and he said if we didn’t buy real estate we were fools because real estate has just skyrocketed in California over the last five years. He said we didn’t have to buy in the hyper-inflated real estate world of the San Francisco Bay Area, but could have bought property elsewhere in California and we still would have made money.

I’ve been thinking about his question since then because of course like everyone else in the room last night, I felt totally stupid when he said that. But you know, the more I think about it the more I feel like I did make money in the last five years and that I’m in a much better financial position than I was in 2000.

First of all, I don’t own a house but I have a positive networth. I didn’t for a long time because I am a serious shopaholic and didn’t care too much about money thinking I was always going to earn it. It wasn’t until I saw the size of my credit card debts that I realized that I was in serious, serious trouble. Well, all that’s changed now. I will be pretty much debt free by the end of year. I will have paid off all my credit cards and my car as well.

The following incidents have helped me achieved positive networth.

1. I’ve always contributed to my company’s 401(k). Sometimes not very much, but I’ve always tried to have money taken out of my check and put into some kind of retirement savings. I did end up taking money out of my 401(k) at some point to pay off some of my debts, which was a big mistake because of the taxes I had to pay, but since then I’ve managed to build the amount back up to what it was before.

2. I moved my money out of the stock market and into money market funds before the market crash in 2001. I probably moved my money out a little too quickly and missed out on some of the market’s bigger gains, but at least my 401(k) didn’t turn into a 101(k).

3. Before the stock market crash, I had some good stock tips and doubled the amount in my 401(k). So I did make money in the stock market boom, which I managed to keep.

4. I was never unemployed during the economic downturn that hit the SF Bay Area after the stock market crash. I was lucky, very lucky and blessed.

5. I forced myself to curb my freespending ways, still a horrifying daily, daily struggle, and made my instead save money. I have money taken out of my check which goes straight into savings. This method really, really works. If it doesn’t hit my checking account it’s like it’s not there.

6. I earn more money now than I ever have in my whole life. My salary increased by 23% since 2000, but this is also my third job since then. The moving around for more money thing really does work.

And it’s not like I didn’t spend any money either. I moved to an apartment that doubled my rent in 2002, and I bought a new car in 2000.

And now I’m like, okay, maybe I’m not financially where I want to be but I’ve made darn good progress in these last five years when I had pretty much negative networth at the start of the millenium.

Yes, I’m still around. I just haven’t felt like writing. I’m having fun with my new laptop. I finished typing up all my handwritten pages of my Texas novel using my new laptop, and that’s been fun. I went to CompUSA yesterday to try to find a laptop sleeve for it, and ended up buying a Mac laptop sleeve because it was the only one I liked. I think I remember seeing laptop sleeves at the SFMOMA store, so I’ll have to make a trip over to there to see if I can find a better sleeve. I just want to find something to cover the laptop when I’m carrying it in my backpack or another bag so it doesn’t get scratched.

What else? I got an A on my Greek Drama midterm. We have to do a 8-10 page paper and I received approval to compare Eugene O’Neill’s “Mourning Becomes Electra” to Aeschylus’ Oresteia. Supposedly O’Neill based this play on Aeschylus’ trilogy and my paper will compare and contrast the two plays. I haven’t read this play since junior high and don’t remember any of it, and I’m looking forward to rediscovering it. I fell in love with Eugene O’Neill’s play “Long Days Journey into Night” when I had to do a book report on a play, and ended up reading most of his works. But like I said it’s been awhile. I wonder if I’ll still love O’Neill as much now that I’m older.

I’ve been reading Mary Shelley’s “Frankenstein” this week, and having only ever seen most of the movies, it’s been fascinating to read the book. The book consists of letters from the captain of the boat in the North Pole to his sister. The sea captain picks up Frankenstein and ends up telling the man his life story. The captain then faithfully writes to his sister all that he’s been told, and Frankenstein even edits the letters to make sure the captain has his story right.

I think Kenneth Branagh’s portrayal of Frankenstein comes the closest to the person written about in the book, but his movie plot version altered the book’s plot in a big way although much of the important plot points were kept in place. No other Frankenstein movie comes to mind except for Gene Wilder’s version. The creature in Mary Shelley’s version is much more menacing and more evil in that 19th century romantic sort of way.

I wonder if the Dracula movies were based on any novels. I’ll have to investigate because that genre of horror movies is a particular favourite of mine.

I typed up 8.5 pages last night, and 2.5 pages this afternoon. I might type up more later when I watch the new NBC series "Revelations". It was on Bravo at 6 pm, and I watched and was very intrigued. It's an interesting series to say the least.

I'm going to try to get up at 5 am to write on the weekdays. I'm not a morning person, but everyone says that writing in the morning is the best. I'm going to have to change my sleeping habits and go to bed between 10-11 pm. What an early time to go to bed. I've been going to between midnight and 12:30 am for years. I need my 6.5 hours of sleep to function, so if I want to get up at 5 am I have to be in bed earlier. Wow! Talk about a change in lifestyle. What a frickin' drag!

I can write at night after work, but it's too easy to have that time gobbled up by other things. I have to think how this is going to affect my workouts. I haven't been going to the gym at all, and I feel guilty because I do pay a monthly fee for it. It's better to go to the guy after 7 pm during the week when it's not crowded. 5 pm to 7pm is the gym's crowded time.

I guess I could still go to a coffee shop and write more or read or something. I haven't decided if I should continue to write by hand or write by computer. If I write by hand, I could spend the time after work typing up what I've written. Or there's always editing. I could be editing after work instead of writing, since editing is a different skill set than writing.

I'm not going to start taking my laptop to work with me just yet. Maybe someday, but not now.

I'm typing up this message in my living room, and typing up pages from the Texas novel on my new laptop and listening to some super storm movie on the SciFi channel. It's kind of cool to be transcribing my handwritten chapters while listening to the tv at the same time. It's so relaxing to sit in my chair and type into my laptop and half listen to a movie on tv. This is so much better than sitting at my desk.

I think I might go to the coffee shop later. I want to finish typing up all my handwritten pages before I start writing again. The next movie is about earthquake aftershocks in New York. I hate earthquake aftershocks. For two years after the big earthquake here, everytime the ground shook I thought it was an earthquake aftershock. I remember being at a friend's tennis court in New York (how rich are you when you have a tennis court as part of your backyard) and feeling the ground shake and thinking it was an aftershock. When I mentioned it to my friend, she laughed and said it was probably just a heavy truck driving by.

I was walking through Golden Gate Park and walking along Stow Lake, when I saw all these people with telescopes and cameras watching these two birds in the tree. There was a woman with a table selling cards, and when I stopped to check it out I found out that we were all watching a blue heron couple mating in the trees.

I heard someone say, "I think she was on top of him." The woman at the table explained that the blue heron couple had produced 71 babies and have been mating in Golden Gate Park for years. It was so cool to watch that I bought a card of the blue heron couple as a souveneir.

It was so beautiful and sunny day in the park, even though it was a little chilly at 60 degreees. I love living next to Golden Gate Park. It's like having this amazing nature preserve as my backyard.

What I will probably end up doing is disabling my wireless network until I want to surf the net from my laptop. Then I'll just reconnect it. It's kind of a pain, but I don't plan to surf the net from laptop very often. At least I hope I don't end up doing that. Now if I can just figure out how to connect my printers wirelessly I'll be happy.

I did end up buying a memory stick, and plan to transport files back and forth between my laptop and my pc that way. I'll have to see how tht works.

So I'm posting from my new laptop, which I just connected wirelessly to my other computer. I wasn't going to do that, but I didn't want to spend another $50 for a phoneline adapter. My wireless network is secure and I don't think anyone else can get in it. I can see other people's wireless networks, and some people do leave them open.

I'll probably end up buying a phoneline adapter because I'm not all that comfortable with connecting wirelessly to my other pc, but at least I did it. YEAH ME!

So I just contacted Dell and I can return my system and reorder a new system with my company discount, but I have to pay to ship the laptop back. And with all the shipping costs involved, I'll end up saving only $40 and I don't know about you, but saving $40 is so not worth the hassle of shipping the system back and reordering and waiting again.

Unless Dell gives even a bigger discount in the next 21 days, then I'll probably end up keeping the laptop I bought.

I'm bummed at myself. I didn't know my company had a program with Dell so employees could buy computers. So I tortured myself and priced the system I just bought, and if I had used the company discount I would have saved myself about $85.

I wonder if I can call Dell and let them know I didn't know about the company discount.

I’ve never been much of a shoe person. I’ve always bought shoes on sale and wouldn’t spend more than $50. After one or two years, my shoes would either fall apart of I’d get bored of them and throw them out. The only time I was really into the quality and cost of my shoes was when I was running marathons. If you’re going to be running continuously for 26.2 miles, choice of footwear becomes a major, major issue.

But who cared about work shoes. I used to wear sneakers to work, and only wore my work shoes in my carpeted office and out to lunch on the street sometimes. Then I had that problem with my heels and had to start wearing very, very comfortable well built shoes that I seemed to only find from European manufacturers. And since wearing sneakers to work is like so last millenium, I wear my comfy, comfy european shoes all day along.

Well, my foot problem is gone now thanks in great part to $2,000 worth of acupuncture treatments but after a couple of years of wearing incredibly comfy shoes, it’s hard to go back to shoes that don’t feel comfortable to walk in all day.

But I now seem to be in a different shoe phase. I am now the proud owner of three pairs of shoes that cost each $300 to $400 retail, which I bought from Ebay. The comfort level is still there, but my shoes are now more stylish not to mention they just plain look more expensive than other shoes. And I only know this because I’ve starting looking at other people’s shoes and trying to guess how much they cost retail.

There is a world of difference between very expensive shoes and cheap shoes, and you can tell just by looking at the shoes. It’s such a weird thing to be aware of, but I am, and I don’t think I’m the only one who notices such things.

So I finally broke down and bought myself a laptop. I just purchased on Dell 700M, and bought myself a new printer/fax/scanner/copier as well. My poor printer although still working, it's an ancient HP Deskjet 722C, is on its last legs. Plus when I had printer/fax/scanner/copier for my work at home job, I really really got used to it. I liked being able to make copies and fax stuff.

I hope I'm doing the right thing. I hope it doesn't just become a toy that I will eventually get tired of playing with. I think I got a good deal though considering I bought a multi-function printer, a port replicator so I don't have to mess with plugging and unplugging wires, 60 gig rather than 40 gig, and a 128 MB memory stick and extra battery that I hope to God I will use.

I just wish it didn't have to cost so much money. That's the part I really, really hate, and wonder if it's worth it to buy new instead of used on Ebay or refurbished at the Dell Outlet.

I think I might be allergic to chocolate and if I am, I will be so bummed. I so love chocolate, but lately when I eat chocolate my mouth itches. I don't know if it's just my other allergies or if I'm truly allergy to chocolate.

I know when I'm stressed I crave chocolate like you wouldn't believe, like it's an addiction. Addictions to food are sometimes a sign of an allergy. Damn, I'll just be like my sister. She's allergic to fish and eats it anyway, and has a constant rash. I used to just lecture her about it, and now I'll be in the same boat if I find out I'm allergic to chocolate. I'll eat it anyway and have my mouth constantly itching, not mention be bloated like a whale for the rest of my life.

AAAAARRRRRRRGGGGGGHHHHHHHH!

I am saddened by the Pope's death. He was a good man and tried to do much for the Catholic Church. Although I disagreed with many of his views, I admired his tenacity for life and how much he kept holding on despite his failing health in the last several years.