Apologies for not writing. I had the worst dream on Sunday morning. I dreamt a friend of mine was dying and he was calling out to me to save him. It was so real and creepy, and it's put me in a blue mood that I can't seem to get out of. I've lost touch with this person, and have no idea how to get a hold of him to find out if he's okay.

I guess I'm spooked because I've three friends die in the last four years, and I was thinking a little about two of them before I heard the news of their demise.

I can't write, and I'm basically just holding on hoping to get through the day and then I go home and lie in bed all night. I felt like I was on the edge of a void, some kind of abyss on Monday night, and by Tuesday morning it felt like I had fallen in. Wednesday morning I woke up feeling like I was still hurtling down the hole like Alice from "Alice in Wonderland".

My intuition tells me to expect shocks, upheavals, and seeds of karma that must and will be harvested. I wish I could turn my intuition off because it's been so wrong before. And of course, my anxiety is going through the roof big time. It's not as bad as it's been in the past, but it's getting up there.

I wish I knew what was going on or how to dig myself out of this blue funk I'm in.

I was suppose to finish Chapter 11 of my Texas novel this weekend, which was one of my writing goals for the month, but it's only half written. I did manage to finish Chapter 10 of the Texas novel and then finish chapter 2 of my "Changing Timelines" novel. Still, it would have been nice to say I wrote three chapters in a month because it would have been a bang up way to start the new year.

Wow, did I spend a ton of money these last three months and I am so paying for it.

In November I took a trip to LA. Then in December I went to Dallas, and in January I went away for my birthday. Then I spent a ton of money on buying a new battery and tires for my car.

And I really messed myself up with my taxes this year. I claimed 2 on my exemptions and I'm barely getting a refund. YIKES! I really like getting a refund on my taxes. I think I may go back to one exemption depending on what my merit increase looks like. I probably would have owed money this year if it wasn't for my deductions.

I just can't spend any money till June now. I hate that. Not that I should be buying new clothes anyway because I feel so fat and gained some weight over the holidays. I'm wearing my fat jeans because they're so much more comfortable than my size 8 jeans right now.

I'm still buying a laptop because I really want one, but not till April when I get my little tax refund. In March my company bonus is supposed to come and since I get paid every two weeks instead of twice a month, I get an extra check in April.

If I'm careful, I will still be on track for paying off my car and all my credit cards this year. I won't be completely debt free because I'll probably go one some kind of vacation this year, but I'll be able to pay it off quicker once my major debts are gone. I think I'll also still be on track for my savings goals as well, if I don't buy anything other than my new laptop.

Thank god, I am pretty through with upgrading everything in my apartment. I still want to upgrade my monitor and get a flat screen, get new computer speakers, and upgrade my printer get a new printer/fax/scanner combo, and upgrade my operating from 256 to 512 because my home computer is just way too slow, but I'll be able to do that after June.

I shouldn't be too whiny about my finances. I'm in the best financial shape I've been in ever, but I hate feeling like I've overspent myself and I so feel like that right now.

I was supposed to work out on Thursday, but my anxiety started to kick in again. At least it happened after I had writte my four pages for the day. Then I just went home and watched TV all night.

"Queen of the Damned" was on and although the movie is sucky, the soundtrack rocks! I was going to buy it until I found out that the Korn guy who sings the vocals for the movie, isn't on the soundtrack cd. Some kind of contractual issues prevented him from being on the cd; what a drag!

I've been having wild dreams all week. I don't remember any of them except that I wake up thinking to myself, what a weird dream. I've been feeling so BLAH this week, and thinking that my life is do drecky! I don't think it's always been this awful. I seem to remember being happy not too long ago.

I still think of the red-haired guy, and I'm sure that's the main cause of my general misery. Honestly, thoughts of the freakazoid will not leave my mind. It's so maddening! I feel so haunted. A friend of mine whose mother was some kind of famous psychic in Paris suggested that he could do a clearing for me. He did it for free which was nice, but he didn't find anything. He told me my misery was internally driven. I hate that! Why would I want to make myself miserable?

Anyway the psychic clearing must have done something, because on the way home I stopped at Borders to look for a book that I need for my Greek Drama. They were out of it at the college bookstore, and a huge bookstore downtown told me that it was on backorder from the publisher for two weeks. But at Borders the book was half off, how great was that? Good thing too because the prof assigned a play out of it this week.

I'm reading "Philoctetes" by Sophocles. I'm also reading my way through CS Lewis' Narnia books. After my CS Lewis kick, I think I'm going on Graham Greene kick since he's my new writing inspiration. Did I mention this before? The New Yorker did an article on him and wrote that Graham Greene wrote 4 handrwritten pages a day.

I like that I'm writing a ton even though I'm fairly depressed. I just hope I don't have to be depressed to write because that wouldn't be a good thing for me.

I decided to count how many pages I had written to see what kind of progress I've been making with trying to establish better writing habits. And much to my surprise, I have written as of today 54 pages. Mind you it's all handwritten pages, and some of the pages are outlines for chapters I'm writing and a character interview as well, but still! That's a lot of pages. I am so impressed with myself!

I still want to get to the point where I'm writing every day, and not taking days off like I have been. Even if I just write one page on busy days, it would still be better than no pages at all. But I know I still have the attitude that if I can't fit in writing four handwritten pages, I'm not going to write all. I have to figure out to break this mindset because when I do take a break, it does take awhile to get back to writing. It's like I lose some momentum every time I take a break. I'd rather have the momentum build slowly and daily till it really starts cooking along.

What's surprising is how easy the 54 pages came. Oh sure I complained a ton and found the whole exercise completely onerous at times, but in retrospect I'm amazed at the number of pages that I've written compared to the amount of time I've put in. It really does all add up, even if you do it a little bit at a time.

It's like saving money I suppose. Even if you just save a little at time, over time the amount keeps growing. Speaking of money, I've been watching it fly much too quickly out of my accounts lately. January is always like this for me. I so freak out at the amount of money I've spent, what with Christmas shopping and holiday spending. I hate digging into my savings, but that's what the money is for right? To pay for things that are out of the ordinary expenses.

God, I can't wait till I pay off my car at the end of this year. I can't wait to have that money freed up. Of course it will all just go into savings, but it will nice to be able to save more money.