Sunday, September 29, 2013

Spiral Notebook Sunday: Thursday, August 26, 2004

Tonight's Spiral Notebook selection features the bitter ravings of a renegade on the front lines of anti-schedule activism. Or something.

Things have improved somewhat since this entry was written--working second shift and presiding over  a single (nineteen-year-old) nestling, it's gotten significantly harder for me to truly "oversleep."

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Thursday, August 26, 2004

To the extent that my life is ruled by The Clock (which, fortunately for everyone involved is to a much lesser extent than most other functioning adults, but is still to a greater extent than I personally consider ideal), I entertain myself with the illusion that I control the clock--an illusion I maintain by tinkering with the clock by setting it so far ahead that I feel I'm getting away with something (a habit I've mentioned previously) and also by setting the alarm itself so long in advance of when I need to get out of bed that I can hit snooze forty gazillion times and, again, feel I'm getting away with something (another previously examined habit). All this tinkering appeals to me as an act of passive rebellion, a way of living outside the constrictive bounds of normal society, but there is a price to be paid for standing up for what you believe in, and in this case, that price, ironically, is often much higher than the price of just going along with the status quo--though now that I think of it, that's probably true of most acts of rebellion: going along to get along is often not only a force of habit but also much easier and less risky than stepping outside the lines of the masses--that price in this case is having to go through mental acrobatics in the form of staggering algebraic equations required to calculate the actual time as well as how many minutes are left until the next "snooze" is interrupted by the jarring drone of the alarm and how many snoozes are left until I actually have no choice but to get out of bed, at which point a good portion of my allotted brain power for the day has been expended so I am not only bleary-eyed and suffering from bed head of truly astronomical (as in "oh my god I've discovered a 10th planet and it's orbiting around my head") proportions, but I'm also befuddled by the kind of brain buzz that comes from an excess of input into an only nominally functioning brain whose closest physiological comparison is a bunch of sugar on an empty stomach. What a way to start a day! And not only a day, but every day, all week, every week because even on my so-called days "off," I keep the alarm set because I always go to bed with the best of intentions for the next day, planning on getting an early start on all those eight million things I put off on al my work days, but when morning comes, as I'm sure is no surprise, I hit the snooze button over and over and over until I'm well past--hours past, in fact--not only the time I had, with my optimistic plans, intended to get up but well past the time I likely would have woken up of natural causes if I had simply left the alarm unset so then I rise groggy and cranky not only from oversleeping and being mad at myself from the previously mentioned performance of complex equations and from mediating the internal debate between my well-intentioned, do-gooder half and my much-neglected, self-indulgent, what-the-hell, you-deserve-it half, my part of which debate is to counsel the dark half that we will all feel better if we get some stuff done and sleeping in ends up being more punishment than reward because nothing gets done and then I feel guilty about it and nothing's done and I never feel all the way awake, unable to shake the crappy, groggy feeling, anyway so the extra sleep is a hindrance to even relaxing and is that really the kind of self-indulgence I might wish to engage in?, to which my darker half replies, "Shut up! You're keeping us awake!"

Wednesday, September 25, 2013

Random Quote Wednesday

"As our culture speeds incessantly toward faster and more convenient forms of communication, there is still something powerful in patiently scripted words, as they languorously flow onto a sheet of paper."

~~David H. Lowenherz
~~The 50 Greatest Love Letters of All Time


Monday, September 23, 2013

Masked Mom's Media Monday: 2 Broke Girls

Let's get this out of the way right up front: I am in no way qualified to review the show 2 Broke Girls because I have seen a total of 13 minutes of the show ever.

From the beginning, the previews promised a particularly vapid and shallow sitcom with a particularly vapid and shallow premise. I was persuaded to watch the 13 minutes I did watch in part because I had enjoyed Kat Dennings in Nick and Norah's Infinite Playlist so much that it was hard for me to imagine her being associated with something horrible. There was also the fact that several people close to me highly recommended the show.

Short story shorter yet, the previews delivered exactly as promised and then some--throwing in clichés, sexism, racial stereotypes and even some classism as an added bonus to the shallowness and vapidity. I clicked away after 13 brutal minutes of stilted delivery of wooden lines (or was it wooden delivery of stilted lines?).

Therefore, I'm obviously not qualified to bring an in-depth perspective to what works and what doesn't on the show. I only mention the show at all because a little boy I used to babysit is all grown up and making a guest appearance on tonight's season premiere of 2 Broke Girls.

Ever since I caught Eric Tiede's appearance on Castle, I have periodically checked in on his Facebook fan page to see when and where he would be popping up next and have gotten a kick out of seeing him in episodes of Major Crimes and Grimm. I have even checked in on a few episodes of shows he's been featured in on Nickelodeon and Disney.

So, this latest appearance presents a real dilemma for this stalkery ex-babysitter: Do I want to see Eric's performance more than I hate 2 Broke Girls?

The episode's in the DVR and the jury's still out.

Masked Mom's One-Word Review: Conflicted.


Saturday, September 21, 2013

What I Did On My Summer Vacation...

I'm not sure vacation is the right word--since five was the highest number of consecutive days off work I logged all summer and two is the farthest number of hours I traveled from home--but I've certainly been gone from these parts for most of the summer. So, perhaps an explanation is in order or perhaps I just needed some mindless, quick and easy way to reenter the blog world on this rainy September morning.

So where has the summer gone? I've worked a lot, including (due to staffing shortages) many shifts that are not my regular shift, leading to acute sleep deprivation (not to be confused with my persistent chronic sleep deprivation).

I've played nowhere near as much volleyball as I would've liked, but what I did play I savored thoroughly, particularly because every time we played, we were surrounded by family and friends we don't get to see anywhere near often enough.

I've gotten nowhere near as much writing done as I would've liked (on the blog, obviously and elsewhere), but the writing I have gotten done has led to two minor publications and a contest win. (In this process, I also discovered (not for the first time) my extraordinary capacity for reflexive self-deprecation since immediately after doing the dance of joy in each case, I caught myself thinking things like "It's just a small magazine..." or "I bet not that many people even entered that contest...")

I discovered yet again that in blogging specifically and in my writing generally1, I am either all in or barely in at all. If I am not doing daily writing practice, I am lucky to pick up the pen once a month. There are no happy mediums for me, apparently--committed daily habit or habitual laziness seem to be my only choices.

I know from experience that all in eventually wears me out, but I also know that it's always a hell of a ride on the way to worn out.

All in.

1. Naturally, this applies to far more in my life than merely writing.