you take the good and bad and make the best of it

"Buildings and Mountains" - The Republic Tigers (free song on iTunes this week)

Last year I was out of work for nearly two months (on two separate instances) due to a flare-up of an inflamed disc in my back. I still have issues with my back, but I don't require vicodin to deal with it anymore. Grimacing a lot and moving slower than your average person seem to suit me just fine. There is no "cure" for an inflamed disc. If anything, I mostly need to just lose weight, and that should ease the pressure on my spine. I'm working on it, but it's slow going.

When I was out of work, doped up, I watched a lot of daytime television: The View, Regis and Kelly, Dr. Phil, Oprah...I was quite the daytime TV junkie. Dr. Phil's show, in particular, held a curious fascination for me. It was like Jerry Springer without the audience participation or foul language. I can't blame the drugs since I find myself still drawn to his show on the rare occasion that I am home during the week. Today, I took the day off and, of course, I watched Dr. Phil. He was pimping his new book and talking to these young women who had their parents get a divorce unexpectedly after 20-some odd years of marriage. His whole point (of what I watched) was that sometimes your heart gets broken, and you will be in shock, and you will be frightened by sudden changes in your life, and no matter how much you think your life is perfect, bad things will happen to you. That was his "help" to these women. It was just inane. A random stranger on the street could have told these people this. And there are thousands who will spend good money on a book filled with these "observations." GOD HELP US.

I procrastinated buying my train tickets for Chicago. Unfortunately, all the seats on the trip down there are already sold out. FABULOUS. Luckily, I could get a sleeping car. It's costing me an extra $225, but at least I'll have a "room" all to myself on the way down. This is reminding me of my trip to and from Barcelona when I was in Europe 10 years ago, except in reverse. Cheap seats on the way down, expensive sleeping car on the way back for that trip. I don't dare tell my parents because they will go balistic on me for not booking my tickets 3 weeks ago. I have no idea why I put it off, I just never got around to it. It turns out my friend Kristy can't make it up to Chicago on the weekend, so I'm just going to come home Friday afternoon. I'm really looking forward to it. It's going to be great!

A friend of mine wrote a blog on her Myspace page that she was feeling rejected because she realized someone had deleted her from their friends list. After reading that, I logged into my
Facebook account and realized that someone there had deleted me. A girl I went to high school with who I couldn't remember from Adam, but when she saw my name on a mutual classmate's friend list, she decided to friend me. I added her to my list after I asked her who the heck she was (I threw my high school yearbooks away 3 years ago when I moved out of my parent's house). Now she's deleted me. I wonder why. I'm half tempted to delete all the people from high school anyway as I never talk with any of them through facebook anyway. I've sent a few messages and gotten virtually no response. Why the hell even friend me in that case? Social networking sites are so stupid, yet so addictive.

I can't even write about John McCain and Sarah Palin. I can't believe the numbers of people who think that either one of them would make a good leader. Another thing about having the day off means that I had time to catch up on a lot that I don't have time to read normally. There's just so much out there, every day there's more and more reason to fear another four years of Republicans in the White House, I just can't even put it into words.