Dear Diary . . . day by day

Thursday, August 17th - Work Woes/Upgrade this/Go, Joe, Go!/Write on!
I have just too much to think about these days. In a way, I love it. There's not really any time to loll about, there's always something I should be getting done, contemplating, working on. But then again, sometimes that amount of work is daunting, and I freeze like a rabbit, nose twitching, wondering where the bite is going to come from, when it's gonna get me.
It doesn't help that I am, most officially, sick. I have been sick all summer, off and on. My sinuses have become this huge mess, and I'm on my second series of antibiotics to clear up the fluid they've left behind my eardrums. My dizziness, weariness - all these bad inesses are just wearing me down. But I have to keep going. Take the new, stronger Claritin, use the nasal spray and make sure to eat when I take my horse-pill antibiotics so I don't get nauseous to boot. I'd be miserable if I had time to be.
Yesterday at work was a madhouse. We had this huge mailing to get out, and it was just me finishing it yesterday afternoon. I forgot to have us stamp the envelopes before we stuffed them, so I was running postage tape through the meter and sticking them on. Judith saw me and started a long series of stops where she would discuss with me better ways to do this - I was wasting resources in her opinion. I became very frustrated by her help, because each time I had to stop and pay attention to her, and explain again why I thought tape was the best way to go. Eventually she started helping me unstuff the envelopes, run them through the postage meter, and restuff and seal them. Argh! Finally Joe came by, reaffirmed my faith in tape, and the three of us busted ass to get the mailings out on time. Well, that day. I had to stay a half an hour late, and I was drenched in sweat by the time we were done.
So, I excused myself from working out. My back hurt from bending over and I was tired and pissy. I get careless when I'm in a bad mood at the gym. I went home.
Home, where I called up MacZone and applied for a loan to buy a laptop. Brendon was my customer service representative, and though he was stiff and formulaic at first, we were soon being very chatty with each other. I've done that kind of job before, and I knew how nice it was to have a good conversation while processing the dreary orders. Getting him to talk to me like a person cut down on the monotone and I could actually begin to understand all my terms and conditions. He warned me that the loan would come through much higher than I requested and he was right: they wanted to loan me up to $5790!! Yikes! I resisted the temptation to upgrade to a better laptop - I had decided I could affored an iBook Special Edition (a little faster than the regular, and they were running a special so I got free an extra battery and an extra 64MB of RAM) and a nice printer. Later, I will buy a fancy desktop (hopefully once the prices on the DVD editions (in Sage) go down in price), but for now, this will suffice. I don't really need the fancy, DVD-playing, copious connectivity of the PowerBook (my boss also warned me that the powerbooks will be dropping drastically in price when Apple comes out with their G4 PowerBooks within a year). I can drool all I want, but a nice, graphite iBook SE will do. Really.
I did splurge on the printer. I got the Cannon Multifunction machine, so I'll be able to print, fax, scan and copy. I can hardly wait. I'm upgrading what I've got right now by leaps and bounds. I'm sure I'm gonna be stuck inside for days playing with all this new stuff, once the paperwork for the loan goes through and it arrives at my doorstep. Well, I'll be inside for the printer. The first thing I think I'll do is take my laptop to the Rose Garden Jeff showed me on Sunday and lounge on a blanket and write! Ooooohhhhhh! I can hardly wait!
I've been watching the Democratic convention (and yes, I watched the Republican one a few weeks ago). My housemates are very into the whole political process, so I'm getting into more than I usually do. I just have to say: can we have Joe Lieberman as President? It's the first time I've ever watched a speech and BELIEVED everything the politician was saying. And you could tell he and his wife were in love. He's so cute! And down-to-earth. And, well, honest! He mentioned god too much for my tastes, of course, but he sure knew how to draw out patriotic feelings - real, melting-pot-of-America patriotism instead of the perfect-Christian-nuclear-family-values patriotism. He had some good lines - especially the one about the Republican convention's attempt to look more diverse and, well, Democratic: "There hasn't been that much acting in Philadelphia since Tom Hanks won his Oscar!" Anyway, go Joe, go! He's what I thought all politicians should be when I was a child. Refreshing.
After Survivor, which was kinda boring this week, I sat down at my computer and finished a story. This was the "Thirds" story, now called "The Camping Trip" though I've just got to change the title. I was relieved, as if I didn't finish it, I was going to turn in something already done, like Feeding Time or Undercurrent. It's too long, The Camping Trip, at 5000 words, but then again, it's a rough draft. I'll have to add some polish before tonight. It's not as good as Cat Enchanter, that's for sure, but I'm trying not to let that bother me.
What else?
Exercise log:

Writing log:
Finished the Camping Trip.
I'm currently reading:
Woman: An Intimate Geography by Natalie Angier
The Clewiston Test by Kate Wilhelm
oh so slowly:
Stars in My Pocket Like Grains of Sand by Samuel R. Delany

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