Tuesday 16 October 2001

Pic of the day: Screenshot from The Sims, taken for my Sim Comic in the works. I found it oddly appropriate.

You know, those days

This was one of those days that you know will be one of those days before it even begins.

I felt slightly queasy last night, so didn't get to sleep until far into the wee hours. And then the clock radio was blaring. It was morning, and I had to get up and go to work. Except I was too sleepy to wake up. I drifted in and out of a kind of consciousness, dimly aware that work time was approaching but unable to muster the energy to get up. Eventually I started to think indecent thoughts until my heart began to beat faster. I then used that energy to get out of bed. I guess anger could have done the trick too, but indecency is kinda more comfortable. I guess if I had been younger and more horny, I might have been late for work anyway ... but once I was out of bed, I immediately turned to other things.

I hurried to turn on the computer so it could boot up while I brushed my teeth and stuff. Then I hooked up Cassie the Cassiopeia, and let her log onto the Internet to download various news sources and Nova Notes. One bright point is that I now usually connect at first ring, after I switched ISP from Telenor to Tiscali. (I had to look up that name – who can remember a name like that? I only remember that they sound Italian.) For some utterly obscure reason, the internal modem in the new PC starts talking to their modem at once, while it often takes several rings to register that there is a Telenor at all, and even then the connection is unstable at best. On the portable, there is no such problem. Oh well. Anyway, I joined Cassie in front of the desktop, trying to read my LiveJournal friends page at the same time. The end result, of course, was that none of us got to finish before I had to rush off for work.

And for good measure, because it was now officially One Of Those Days, the computer hung when I tried to turn it off from the start bar. Unlike the portable, this one doesn't do that. But today, since I was already late, it did. It was either flip the power switch or get too late for work. Flip.

***

I've promised the management not to write about work, in exchange for ... uh, I don't know. Them not writing their own journal about the stupid things I do, perhaps? As if they needed to. But anyway, not a word about work. Use your own imagination. I did get to listen to the radio occasionally, though. Evidently the town hall in the Norwegian town of Notodden had received a letter with a mysterious powdery substance. The town hall was now closed and nobody got in and out, for fear of anthrax. The letter was, incidentally, posted in the neighboring village of Sauherad (literally translated "Sheep County", which I guess is pretty descriptive).

When the lunch break approached, I had to run for the toilet and stay there well into the break. I'm sure you don't need any description of this. I just include it for completeness.

I considered stopping by the video store after work and rent a DVD – I haven't rented any since the Crouching Tiger movie last Monday and have considered doing so while it is still new enough to be fun. Besides, renting DVD might encourage them to take in more DVD. And, watching DVD would give my hands a bit of rest, compared to playing Daggerfall and writing. But I realized that I would probably play Daggerfall anyway. (And besides, I had no idea whether I will be healthy enough to go to town tomorrow.) This at least showed some foresight, though by now my right hand does indeed hurt.

***

The commuter bus home from work was quite unremarkable. A young woman nearby evidently met an old friend and told him very loudly about her plans to go to some third world country for a while, evidently to spread the Gospel, since the two of them agreed that it seemed to be the Endtimes. She was evidently very excited over this, giggled a lot and barely refrained herself from squealing. I did not fall asleep until a few minutes before my stop.

Coming home, I quickly discovered that there was no chocolate in the house. There was yoghurt, and I ate that. On the other hand, I have mainly eaten yoghurt for two and a half day now, and I still feel a bit queasy ... I started to play Daggerfall, then became very tired and crawled off to bed to take a nap. I just woke up now in time to write my journal before midnight. One more day added to eternity.

But it was worth it. I got an e-mail from an old friend. Yay friends! Where there are friends, there is a taste of Heaven.