My boyfriend just did a strip-tease inside of Final Fantasy. This goes perfectly with my obvious realization that my primary attraction is long-haired geeks. I'm so in love now...

I don't like ads that are supposed to bring awareness to a cause without making it clear what that cause is.

A good example is one I've seen on the sides of buses for the last couple months. Three color-blindness test circles spell out the letters MLK. The caption says, 'Honor his vision by testing yours.' Is this ad trying to make a statement about 'color blindness' in race issues? (A term I've had issues with—I agree with the intent but not what it's actually saying. Blame it on art school #1.) Is it actually connecting eyesight with Martin Luther King Jr.? Is it trying to say something else altogether?

I saw a flier on a pole that was obviously trying to make a statement, but without knowing the statement I don't know what kind of mental response to give in return.

I finally got to work obscenely early, since as I was walking up the hill to the bus, Jason was driving home from work. He offered me a ride and I got there just after 7.

<stari> i want a brownie
<stari> brownies make good breakfast
<stari> and i consider breakfast anytime food
<stari> so therefore i should have a brownie

So I logged into Final Fantasy quickly at work to check my plants, and of course my character would have to be naked.

I banned myself from looking at headlines on the newspaper stands, as Andrew banned me from going postal on my coworkers (yeah all of them, I'm feeling indiscriminate today.) Seeing Bush's name, and his supporting an amendment to defend marriage or protect marriage or whatever it is he thinks needs to be done to prevent society from falling apart as it will if two people in love who happen to be of the same gender get married, is adding to my stress level in unhealthy ways.

But when I got back from lunch Andrew had sent me this Onion article that's the best thing I've read all day—Massachusetts Supreme Court Orders All Citizens To Gay Marry.

I was just introduced to a new girl in the billing department. I guess I can safely assume that neither Selina or I got the job.

My Headache of Doom has mostly faded to the level that it can be explained away by outside causes—not enough sleep, not eating breakfast, being at work. Karla seems to cycle through issues. Since I've called her on her irrational tantrum throwing, she's gone back to some serious order hoarding in the morning. I desperately need to get to work early but my alarm has developed the defect of letting me sleep from 5:55, when it goes off, to 6:45, when I need to leave to catch the early bus, with no awareness of having hit the snooze button for all the time in between.

k762x51mm: I may be a bad person, but I admit, my reaction to your recent LJ posts was mostly, "Woohoo! Nekkid pictures!" I mean, yes, sure, it's disturbing about your dad, but... woohoo! Nekkid pictures. ;)

Paul keeps asking me if I have plans for Bissextile Day. I can see how it would sound like the kind of thing we'd celebrate.

The 'Mom Found Blog' Onion article is all the more appropriate. (Unfortunately it's no longer in their archives.) This time it's worse than I imagined... Story starts here.

Missing rebate form for my new router. Must have cleaned too well, but I knew better than to throw it out, looked important. Frustrated. Must take drugs and go to bed.

My headache seems to have decided to give way to leg ache.

I found Zak McKracken II, the fan-made sequal to one of my all time favorite games!! It seems to be originally a German project that's been translated for the world. I've only had time to start up the beginning, but it looks quite authentic. Someone obviously put a lot of work into this.

I finally a space cleaned and my new printer hooked up. A working printer is such a beautiful thing... I did a couple test prints of a Final Fantasy map and a CD cover I made and it's incredibly sharp. Unfortunately the cleaning I started to get this far is nowhere near done.

After three days without a working phone they finally replaced it with a shiny new one. And as expected, I had 25(!) messages from the credit department, making sure I was aware of the fact that I wasn't answering my phone and giving me explicit details to find orders that have long since gone through.

There are new signs at the bus entrance to the bus tunnel, 'Mandatory security stop' with red lights on top, not in use at the moment but ready and waiting for the next security alert. It seems everyone wants us to return to some idyllic past where neighbors waved hello and terrorism happened to those other countries, but are doing so by security checks and forced suspicion. There are new signs on the bus saying that security is everyone's responsibility, be alert, let the driver know of anything out of place. Since when is a bus trip a time of civil service? I want to read my book and be oblivious as always.

The weird thing about overhearing phone conversations is sometimes you can't tell if the person is talking about a small child or a pet.

"What? I'm only six hours late..."

To make me feel better Michael sent my this link, Cambodian king backs gay marriage.

I think the Headache of Doom (nine days and counting) hit migraine status last night. It's hard to say since I'm not really a headache person and I don't want to disrespect actual micron sufferers. I know it an extra horrible headache, and from research, one that comes with extra symptoms. So if I can downgrade the severity to 'really bad' and grab a few symptoms off the list, (nausea, dizziness, difficulty concentrating) there it is, very suddenly.

I feel weird calling into work over a headache but it still wasn't letting me be functional this morning. No one believes you're sick on a Friday in an office (especially on a nice day—hey, it's a nice day) so I'm going in for the last couple hours to get my paycheck and give everyone my headache... They are contagious, right?

"I'd tell my mom that I was bi, that I go to fetish clubs, that I'm into BDSM, but I would never tell my mom that I was dating a Republican."

I'm starting to get into a whiney state. I wanted to bang my head against the wall but that'll only make it worse. Someone please make my head stop hurting already!

I went into the downtown Payless Shoes looking for some last minute boots before sandals take over. No luck on the boots, but I walked out with some adorable Hello Kitty merchandise. I got the one black, not pink, Hello Kitty drawstring backpack, and a pair of slipper socks that may be too small for me but that won't stop me from trying.

I'm having too much fun with my shredder, making paper confetti strips. All paper products are being shredded on their way into the recycling bin. At least it saves space...

While we're banning smoking indoors, why don't we start a ban on indoor hairspray? One of my co-workers has to redo her hair daily and leaves the bathroom (the same one people eat in) smelling like a California middle school girls' locker room (at least from the time I was in middle school in California—we actually had a section in the yearbook about the hair.) I swear I can feel it make the inside of my lungs stick together.

I finally fixed the best typo ever (Paul reminded me of it, disappointed that someone had already commented) but it had to be saved for posterity: 'gotta figure out how to get head into my room'.

One of my squishy moose wandered off in the night. I don't know how it happened but he was found on the other side of the room, somewhere around the desk of the Scary One. This could explain something about my phone...

I know at least half the purpose of a written rant is that other people can be entertained by your misery. So I hope I come off more entertaining than whiney in the end, even though I started off whining.

Gotta love days that start like this... Alarm clock jumps from 5:55 to too-late-to-bother. I can't get up and out the door in ten minutes (less?) to catch the earlier 66 that might still get me downtown early. And in the end I'm almost guaranteed to miss the on-time bus.

Headlines in the newspaper stands say, 'Rush to stop flood of gay marriages' and 'Research links antibiotics, breast cancer'. Couldn't see the details but I've been on long-term antibiotics for my rosacea. Feels frivolous but when it's at its worst it's more necessary than cosmetic.

Ran out without breakfast and the bakery is out of bottled water. Can't risk running across the street to a store and missing the bus I already missed. I walked down to the next stop to catch a 66 that never came. Took a 70 that almost got me downtown in time, but not.

Karla's been hoarding in the mornings again so I'm desperate to get there early. She's gotten stealthier at it, leaving me enough to look good but having twice as many herself. I'm faster than her which annoys her and exasperates the problem for me.

In the bus tunnel a man stands next to me and says he needs to see a psychiatrist and then goes on about a square in the Christmas tree, there's a square in the Christmas tree, and some things that go too quickly to understand. He repeats the line about needing to see a psychiatrist. (Yeah, I think I got that.)

My bus got stopped by a train signal, not long enough to mention but when you've got a good rant going it wants to keep momentum. Besides, what else is a blog for, if not to be able to force people to listen to whatever you say (nevermind that they're covering their ears and singing to themselves.)

My phone was dead again. It was dead Friday, most of Monday, and now it refuses to cooperate with anyone. When I went to get some tea Joanne told me the coffee maker at the end of the hall was broken and kept yelling it at me so many times while I said I still need to get to the tea bags that I forgot sugar too.

Now I have brownies to make up for it. I have more brownies than I know what to do with.

Did I mention the Ebola?

My legs look like someone's been beating me up.

My lower legs are still bruised from the fall down the hill, especially the large lump that hasn't gone away, so I'm not concerned about that part. I bruise easily, or more accurately, bruise spontaneously and my thighs especially tend to look like someone's been grabbing them too hard with their fingertips, leaving little spot bruises speckled around. My thighs are now covered with more than I can count, many of them quite severe looking. I don't usually take note of spontaneous bruising as I've had it my whole life, but I think it might be go back to the doctor as an adult and say "What's wrong with me?" Unfortunately that means I should also talk to my dad and try to get some kind of information out of him since it won't do me any good to try to explain, "Well I have this thing... I'm told it's rare... and they did some tests when I was two..."

I told you I had Ebola. Now I gave it to Jason.

I even got Andrew to agree Karla needs medication.

I was looking at apartment rentans in the online classifieds, just trying to get an idea of what my options will be like if I decide to move out when Jason does. Found a 2 bedroom appartment in Queen Anne for $1000/mo, same as I'm paying now, so I guess it's possible.

What I was always told back in the days of Drivers' Ed was that "driving is a privilege, not a right." So why is it when people suggest that older people have stricter requirements on renewing their licenses, their right to drive outweighs public safety?

I'm sure there was more to say on Friday and beyond but the days of caffeine withdrawal, and today's headache that still won't go away, wiped it all away.

While cleaning my desk I found a free gift card sent to me by the Blu Water Bistro that expires today, so we'll cover the required food part of V-day tonight.

I didn't read about it until today or I would have planned to be at yesterday's Don't Amend Rally.

Andrew and I spent a pretty non-traditional Valentines Day instead playing Final Fantasy with an in-person as well as online group and gained two levels each!. We certainly weren't going out when the restaurants would be overrun by couples with pink hearts burned into their eyes.

I am now more convinced that life is a movie where the same extras are reused occasionally. There was a standard Unabomber style crazy looking man at the bus stop. I'm sure I've seen this same one before, even in movies playing standard crazy looking guys.

What really caught my attention and convinces me he's a movie extra is his stomach. He looks like a normal-sized man who has a pillow hanging over his belt. I kept wondering if he was maybe keeping stuff underneath his clothes for safe keeping.

I woke up cold again with every blanket I have on me. I had to tell myself that being cold isn't a legitimate reason to call in sick, and neither is 'I really, really don't want to go'. Being adult is like being your own parent, having to call yourself on your own attempts to get out of things.

My roommate is breaking up with me!

Okay, it's more like I just found out Jason's moving out at the end of the summer, but after going from roommates who hated me on sight to one who doesn't mind my "houseplant" tenancies and can occasionally cuddle with, I'm worried about finding a suitable replacement. And I've wanted to get out of this place to somewhere newer feeling (an actual apartment I suppose) which brings up all kinds of scary moving concerns.

I may have another reason to call in sick tomorrow. Andrew banned me from complaining about work to him because I'm not "doing anything about it" (as compared to all that time he spent complaining about Earthlink.) After another instance of her slamming down the printer paper box on the desk and going at it with an angry force that tells me she needs anger management help more than a job, I decided to do something.

I sent her an internal message after work that she'll get in the morning. I'm forfeiting my opportunity to get there first so she won't be reading it in my presence.

A note on the paper:

If there's an issue with the printer paper, you can either:
1. Leave it alone and I'll take care of it as always, changing the paper when it's out.
or
2. Take care of it yourself at whatever time makes you happy.

The level of the paper box is never in my direct line of sight, so I rely on a feature called the 'out of paper alarm'. It works quite well, but passive aggressive attempts to let me know I failed to read your mind aren't productive in the least.

Thank you.

I hope this doesn't get me in trouble, either with her or more in general. I admit it was technically passive aggressive of me to send this as an email, but it's not possible to say these things to her without triggering a conflict.

Whatever the outcome, Andrew promised me extra cuddles tomorrow to make up for it.

In the meantime, I've gone the entire day without (black) tea. The complete lack of energy (remember to breathe...) is either my period trying to start, caffeine withdrawal, or a general depression centered around work. The background headache is giving itself away more specifically.

Straight from CNN, Barbie and Ken are breaking up.

I put two kinds of painkillers and a glass of water by my bed last night, and gave myself permission to at least consider calling in sick if I woke up crampy too early for the luxury of strong drugs and a couple hours of sleep for it to go away. I woke up this morning freezing (gotta figure out how to get heat into my room) but no notable pain. It's taunting me. I think it's going to hit for real tomorrow, along with the tease of 'one more day and it would have been safely the weekend!'.

Oh the tyranny of Nice Days! I have a sandwich from the bakery and I'm all set to spend lunch inside with my laptop, but it's beautiful warm and sunny out. Mothers everywhere, as well as my own need of sunlight, are obligating me to go outside.

Brownies make good breakfast.

I know it's about as interesting as updates on the weather, but it was completely light out when I got up this morning (the later time because I had a ride.) I thought my monitor was left on, lighting up the room.

I walked by the headline 'Bush to back amendment prohibiting gay marriage' with the subhead 'civil unions ok'. I would like to be able to sit down and rationally explain to the man his mistakes, but at the moment I would want to scream, "But they're the same thing!&qout;

Marriage and civil unions as far as the government is, or should be, concerned are the same thing, a piece of paper saying these two people have a legal connection and the benefits of such. A marriage outside of legalalities is defined by a person's religion, spirituality, or society, most often combining the two.

I keep wondering, if gay couples aren't allowed to get married but have a civil union, what are they then? Unionized? Civilized?

It started out calm with Karla having just come back from her vacation, but it only took until 2:00 for another psycho-girl incident. She is making it extremely clear that she is disgusted at my entire existence for not noticing that the printer paper was low.

A note to wheeled pedestrians: bicycles are subject to traffic laws too. I don't care about people who jaywalk, as long as jaywalkers take the responsibility to not get themselves hit. (People who amble across the street in front of cars expecting them to stop drive me crazy.) Bicycles however are not the lowest on the food chain and therefore have greatly responsibility than themselves. I can't count how many times I've seen a bicyclist sail thorough a red light as if it doesn't apply to them. And, I've been nearly run over by them because people on bicycles aren't watching for people on foot, but people in cars.

There's a news van in the little nook of Louisa by the bakery. Who's making news on my street?

I just had the fun of shaving my legs for the first time since my injuries last week. I wouldn't bother but wearing my tall boots with leg stubble makes my legs itchy.

Karla was off today for her birthday which meant first, freedom from psycho-girl. Second, that I was too busy to pay attention. It seemed a pretty constant barrage at the rate one person can handle, except that I have to go to lunch sometime. So I ended up with 45 minutes of overtime today.

I'm making friends the elementary school way. If you remember those little holiday parties we used to get, whoever brought the best treats was the most popular kid in class, at least for that day. Today I bought a box of 'brownie bites' which I have no problem sharing because it means I can not in any way be accused of having eaten the entire thing myself.

Andrew had to deliver me pasta in exchange for me cooking dinner. I still cannot comprehend being out of pasta. Pasta is perpetual, especially spaghetti, always around as a backup food. How could the pasta fairies have forgotten to refill my kitchen?

Paul will have to be impressed, or at least leave me alone for another month. I finally went to the gym. Preparing for sore arms tomorrow.

We had the most beautiful rain today. I was walking to lunch and looking at the gray sky, realized that it wasn't in any way a dreary gray. In fact it was bright, energetic, as if the sun was lighting it from behind instead of trying to fight its way through.

Around the block I was under my umbrella but walking into the sun, with a patch of blue sky and white clouds. Then once inside there was a rainbow just outside the door.

Andrew called me from work later. Factoria had its own share of interesting weather and a thunder storm knocked out their power.

I want to go on Depo. I know this thought won't hold up to any real research, especially given all the horror stories I've heard about Depo-Provera. The part about a shot given in the muscle of your arm is enough to scare me off. (I've never had one so it sounds horribly painful and invasive.)

I went off the pill because I'd been on it so long I wanted to know what my body was like in its natural state. Well I think I've had enough of my natural state and body fluids. I've been too up close and personal with my fertility for a while. I'm not talking about pregnancy scares, but that perfectly natural change in discharge around ovulation to be extra thick and goopy and hospitable to sperm. (This is what the advanced rhythm method is all about.) Then, as soon as that's over with it's replaced with the traces of blood that always have me saying, "But it's too soon!" My actual full-blown period has gotten shorter, but with the gearing up time before and the trailing off time after, I think I'm bleeding to some extent for two weeks!

No periods for three months sounds nice. PMS for three months however does not. I'm going to be making an appointment soon with Planned Parenthood to discuss options.

I could be considered a true addict since I'm technically playing Final Fantasy all day. I've had my character logged in all last night and all day today to sell things from her bazaar.

I have to remind myself that no one wants to read Final Fantasy humor, except people who are already in the game with me. But yesterday I learned that

I did manage a burgundy sweater this morning at least. There was a noticeable handful of people wearing red in the office, but someone told me burgundy doesn't count. Burgundy counts, right? It better count since this sweater is making me look fat. I've felt fat lately in that "I feel fat" way that no male will dare touch.

If I went to bed before midnight these last few nights I may have been awake enough to consider red underwear.

I guess to balance getting to work early, the last two days I've had to admit I wasn't even going to make it on time before I left the house. This partially because of my body demanding that I eat breakfast, by way of simultaneously feeling like someone's squeezing my head in until I pass out and my stomach feeling like it's trying to implode. (It hurts, like Ebola.)

I don't think anyone else is going to be up to it so I'm quoting myself tonight:

"i'm not going to channel my PMS for the greater good" – me

"i'd like to work for planned parenthood as much as i'd like to work in internet porn" – also me

I found out through an HR email that tomorrow is 'National Wear Red Day For Women', an awkward wording but it says so on their site. I desperately need to fold laundry but if I get some done I might try wearing color tomorrow.

Another work rant suppressed because I just don't have the energy to go through it again after the fact.

I forgot to post this yesterday but this should be forgivable since I was up much too late trying to finish writing.

Massachusetts court upholds same-sex marriage. The really exciting thing about this, I learned from NWR, is according to the Full Faith And Credit clause of the Constitution, legal marriages in Massachusetts will have to be recognized in the rest of the country.

Also in the article,

"Wednesday's ruling came a week before a constitutional convention will be held by state lawmakers to consider an amendment legally defining marriage as a union between men and women. That amendment would have to be ratified by both houses of the Legislature in two successive legislative sessions and then be ratified by voters."

I didn't realize they were already going through with it, a constitutional admendment to take away our rights. This whole thing reminds of a little boy picking up all his marbles and pouting because he can't get his way, "The Constitution doesn't let me do what I want so I'm going to change the Constitution!

The world is saved from yet another work/Karla rant from yesterday on. It's late and I don't have the energy to keep it going.

"The thing is, there's little point in stalking me. I'm friendly enough with most people that I'd invite them in." – Phil

After all the joking I've done about drinking soy sauce straight from the bottle, I just tried my first sip. I should be ashamed to admit that, but it was a really small bottle.

No one tell Jason! I'm making blasphemous rice. I didn't want to go through the trouble of cleaning out the rice cooker which is buried in the sink, and I only needed a little bit to go with my broccoli. He probably doesn't even know that box of Minute Rice is still there.

Sausage is such a weird creature. Now normally I don't eat sausage at all—I'm not much into meat, especially meat of unrecognizable origin stuffed into a tube, but Andrew found these potato sausages that I like. (Since everyone keeps asking, potato sausage is a pork sausage with pieces of potato inside.)

I've even been cooking them by myself, a big deal for me because that requires: 1. cooking 2. cooking something that splatters scarily. Handling the uncooked sausage however, the soft tube of raw meat, no matter how mature a cook I try to be, reminding myself of my annoyance at anything that happens to longer than it is wide being called "phallic" (as if the penis is so exalted that anything that shape must have been designed after one rather than a common basic shape in nature—perhaps penises were modeled after sausage,) I find myself getting giggly despite myself.

I was thinking back to when Misha was the dominating evil presence in my life. The archives should document the time of her as my roommate (when I found out she had plans to kick me out, supposedly with the landlady's backing, among other things.) Now I have Karla filling the same role in my life. It makes me wonder if there must always be someone filling this position. I know that life cannot be expected to be without conflict but it can't be that there must always be someone going out of their way to compromise my mental stability.

I got off the bus and there was actual light in the sky, actual blue straight up. There were still street lights on, definitely on the dark side, but actual light when I get home from work. I've made it to the other side of Solstice and all is well.

I wonder what it means when someone looks at my Emily calendar—this month's caption says "Who's the strangest of us all?"—and then looks at me for a suspicious length of time.

I'm looking at a cup of au gratin instant mashed potatoes trying to figure out if it has any nutritional value whatsoever to justify me eating it. I didn't eat breakfast, as usual. Normally I can make it to 11 with enough milk and tea, when by that time the deli next door may or may not have gotten the sandwiches in, and may or may not have sold out of the good ones if they came in earlier. Today my tea tastes off, I think because of the unknown brand of milk I got out of the food wheel.

How can there be such a thing as stuffed mashed potatoes? It would have to be more blended by then.

It turns out the guy who was cashiering was just a temp. It's too bad because I liked him. A much more meek-looking girl started today, though that could easily enough be first-day stress. Still I think about Ted saying he wanted someone who could hold up to, essentially, male warehouse talk.

Off the bus, I walked up the hill instead of down because voting for this area takes place at the local school library. Two school levies are up for renewal and I don't see how anyone could argue that schools don't need money. The place was empty except for the volunteers and they thanked me many times for showing up.

On my way back down the hill I tripped over the sidewalk or my own two feet or something and had a drastic fall down the concrete. Both legs are scraped up and bruised from the knees down and my backpack went flying, with my laptop in it. I had to stay down for a couple minutes waiting for the initial pain shock to wear off before limping home.

I at least made checking my laptop my second priority after seeing how much I was bleeding. I'm lucky the bag landed face down when I keep the laptop in back.

Andrew just sent me the invite to Orkut, another Friendster-type web site that's invitation-only for the moment. I have one friend, and it wanted me to be very sure that Andrew was really my friend. My turn-ons are 'long hair, thunderstorms, sarcasm'.

My boss approached me during the slow lunch hour, when Karla and most of the salespeople are gone. My laptop as out early because there's no billing work. "So Rebecca..." I managed to not look panicked as I finished that sentence in my head, "I thought you were told not to bring that in anymore..." or one of a million variations.

"The printer is getting really light. Why don't we see if there's another ribbon you can change to to?" Oh! So I changed the ribbon.

I was told a long time ago that if you can get away with something once here then you can keep getting away with it. (Cat ears, purple hair, laptops.) I guess I'm good now.

I scared Izzy off with the Ebola...

The Ebola is everywhere!! I just downloaded a file from Reston, Virginia, the very place the monkey-flu Ebola Reston strain was discovered.

The phrase, 'two enemas in a paper bag' finally showed up in my search queries, but I think I did that one myself. Also found:

bad batz maru
kitty nard
www.jesus.calm
sarah mclaughlin possession stalker song
scorpios and cuddling
origami ninja stars
you're ugly and your momma dresses you funny
bad_httpd_conf
down loud auto clicker
polyamoury in montreal
siamese/himalayan cats
ad izzy pantyhose
tylenol commercial kermit
my first vibrator

It's time to check my search query stats again. I thought I was still categorized and 'Sanrio porn'.

Hello,

I am creating a web directory, The-Insight.com, and would like to include your website Happy-clicker.com under the "religion/islam" category. If you'd like to be added, please follow this url:

http://www.the-insight.com/add.cgi

We shall put all our efforts into having your link up in less than 24 hours; and if you find our site useful for your visitors, please add a reciprocal link.

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Oh no! My tax dollars are going to Times New Roman!

Andrew sent me the link with the note, 'oh, you're going to hate this'. I hate the font Times New Roman, and I have an appreciation for Courier New. Modernize, fine, but how is Times New Roman modern? Don't let that 'new' in the name fool you.

Dogster, Friendster for dogs. No, forget I posted that. This falls under the 'web-sites-that-shouldn't-exist' category.

Giving into the pressure to say something about the exposed breast at the Superbowl (oh no, breasts!), Bush slept through the half-time show. Bush also probably slept though the lesson on how to download celebrity porn videos off the net.

Everyone can now rejoice—I finished reading the Hot Zone, the book on Ebola, this morning so my fascination with extreme African viruses should start fading. Or I might continue the virus theme in my next book.

As soon as I realized the cave where Ebola is thought to have originated is in Kenya, I've had this song in stuck in my head nearly nonstop (and it's all Andrew's fault.) Lions and Tigers and Ebola, only in Kenya. (Okay the Ebola isn't in the song.)

I've never been able to reliably remember the PIN number to one of my check cards. After two failed attempts the cashier ran it through as a credit card and I suddenly realized I was trying to use my voice mail code for my PIN number.

It's been a lucky coincidence that when I started taking my laptop to work my boss was out sick for an extended period of time. He's back today and so far so good.

My weekend Ebola seems to be going away. I woke up Saturday with a headache and sore throat, some initial Ebola symptoms. It's then supposed to add on a backache before moving on to all the nasty parts. (Ebola is the super-virus—just about any symptom you can think of can fit into the Ebola classification.) Sunday I woke up with the headache and sore throat again, and sore stomach muscles as if I'd been doing sit-ups in my sleep. I guessed that could be the backache coming out on the wrong side. And then there's the bruises, though you could argue I've had those all along.

I was hoping for a localized outbreak in my office, specifically on the other side of my desk. My headache's gone away, my sore throat's gone away, and I haven't started bleeding out of anywhere I'm not supposed to. There's the 24-hour flu and the 48 hour flu, and the weekend Ebola.

There was an article in the paper today about antidepressants making children suicidal. Now talk about contradictory side effects...

Seriously though, the studies are missing the point. The problem isn't a side-effect of the drug but the nature of depression. The most dangerous point in a depression is right after starting treatment, the time when someone is surfacing but still in the gray area, still depressed but regaining the energy to do something about it.

I realized because of this that it might actually be better that I wasn't treated as a teenager when I spent a lot of time in that passively suicidal state—a time spent wanting to die but not wanting to bother to make the effort when there's no difference between doing it today or doing it tomorrow tomorrow or next week and maybe in the meantime the bus will go off the road or my bike will get hit by a car or the world will just end altogether.

Happy um... Groundhog Day. I've really never been sure what the point of this holiday is (and don't say groundhogs.)

Walker: Well you could do without the hairy taco and the bearded clam.

I went to the last day of the Erotic Arts Festival with Walker today. Much pretty art. There was a number I wanted to buy if I had unlimited cash, ones I would actually want on my wall rather than to admire in a gallery.

Looking at art generally makes me want to make more art. Looking at this art makes me want to make more... Interesting art.

I'm trying to fill in the blanks, but honesty there was nothing worth saying over the last week other than a lot of ranting about work stuff (psycho-girl). Anything else I had to say was overshadows by that and lost unfortunately.