All Or Nothing

When Doing Nothing Is More Tiring Than Working All Day And Night

So, to start this I am going to have to assume that we've all got our weaknesses and that we can all admit to them.  Ok?  So, if you're reading this and think to yourself, "Hmm, I'm not sure what she's getting at, because I am perfect in all ways and have no faults to speak of" then go ahead and grab the mouse, slowly pull the arrow to the top corner of your screen, and hit that X.  Go ahead!  I'll wait.

All right.  Now the rest of us are flawed individuals, yes?  Here we go: I am a lazy, lazy girl.  If completely left to my own devices, I would probably move just enough to assure the most faithful observer that I wasn't actually dead.  I might sleep 14 hours a day.  I might not leave the house for weeks at a time.  Seriously.  I just don't require a lot of....hmmm.  Stimulation?  Activity?  I don't easily bore, that's for sure.  In fact, I can hardly imagine a time in life when I have been genuinely bored.  Usually if I find myself in a situation where I don't absolutely have to use brain power, I'm asleep.  And if I didn't make it abundantly clear in this post, I really, really like to sleep and have never, to date, found it to be boring.  Maybe I was bored once when I had to watch a really long training video for Applebee's, when I was training as a waitress there in 1999.  That's really one of the more boring things I have on tap in my memory.  But even then, I think I was probably just happy to be sitting in a dark room, not having to talk to anyone for a while.

I've spent lots of time trying to explain this strange character flaw propensity of mine to others.  Because seriously, you don't have to entertain me. You don't even have to talk to me at all!  You can sit me in a corner and hand me an old Reader's Digest from 1987 and I'll sit there, giggling to myself, for hours.  And then I'll probably go to sleep, curled in a little ball on the floor.  No need for a bed!  I'll just stretch out right here, thanks a lot.  In fact, the more activities you have scheduled, the less happy I'll be.  Just give me long, extended periods of time that stretch out before me with nary a thing to do and I'll be as content as anyone you've ever met.

Unfortunately, I have not figured out a "career" where I can fully utilize these talents.  If any of you know of one, please leave your suggestions in the comments.  Or send me an email!  I can check email for hours.  Never boring.

Since I keep finding myself stuck in careers that DON'T make the best use of my abilities, I find myself constantly having to do things.  Sometimes I have to talk to people all day long, sometimes I have to sit down and work out spreadsheets of invoices and due dates, and sometimes I have to spend hours returning what seems like hundreds of missed phone calls.  Other times I have to schlep myself all over the country for markets, where I have to haggle with either incredibly snobby or non-English-speaking individuals about the prices and quantities I may or may not want of their merchandise.  And then I have to schlep myself back home!  And, get this.  Keep working.

It's relentless!  It never ends, the working.  And so sometimes I find myself engaging in this incredibly unhealthy and unhelpful thing where I sort of just don't do anything.  Which would be ok, I guess, if all the things that I needed to do sort of stopped coming, but they're never so gracious.  They keep right on piling up, and the more I ignore them, the more they demand attention.  So. Rude.

Then I find myself stuck in this awful cycle, where I know when I do address the ever-present Work, I will feel quite overwhelmed by the sheer mass of it all.  And so then I reason with myself to ignore it for just one more day, because one day isn't that big of a deal anyway, right?  And then I spend the entire day with the weight of the Piles of Work on my shoulders, and I don't have any fun because I can't relax because Oh My Goodness I Have So Much To Do But Really It's SO Much That I Can't Deal With Doing It So I Just Won't But Wow, There's Really A Lot Of Work!  That I'm Not Doing!

And I berate myself in such a way that an entire day can pass where on paper, I have completed exactly nothing, but in my mind, I have gone through the wringer about seventeen times. 

So!  I either need to stop with my cycle of procrastination (which has occurred to me, lest you think I am completely stupid, but sadly falls under the category of easier said than done) or I need to come up with a career where I truly can do nothing.  At the House of Blues the other night in Dallas, one of the lines in a song from the opening band went something like "Every year there's one morning I wake up and tell myself that next year, well next year, I'll get it all together". 

I think that might be my problem.  Because see, I've always been more of the type who looks at the clock, sees that it's 5:45pm, and tells myself that tomorrow I'll get it all together.  And all the while, there are people out there giving themselves a year to get things squared away!  I have obviously set my standards too high.  Tomorrow, pshaw.  No wonder my tomorrows always end up looking eerily similar to my todays.

Have A Glass Of Wine For Me Today

That title should be a song.  Is it a song?  It just sounds kind of melodic.  Somebody get on that.

Today I am celebrating, because it is the anniversary of the store.  Of store ownership.  Of business ownership.  Of not going completely bankrupt or completely insane (although some may disagree with the latter, but to them I say it was inevitable; perhaps the store brought it on sooner, perhaps not).

Anyway!

Today marks the start of our third year in business.  Cody insists that to mark it as such, I am not being completely forthcoming with myself.  He says it is the store's two year anniversary.  I think that since this is my third July, and will be my third holiday season coming up shortly, it is a glaring shame to not mention the word THREE in there somewhere.  To say TWO, it sounds so much less, like I've hardly done anything really, just two years of all this work.  When no, this is the third time around for all these things! 

And yet, I can't say it is our three year anniversary.  So I have to say vague things like "We're celebrating the start of our third year!" or "Our third year starts today!"

Cody wonders why I can't say the words TWO or SECOND in relation to the event.  I tried to explain it to him using this as an example.  He immediately understood.  Or, at least, he understood that he doesn't understand, but he knows what happens in instances like these, when I am grasping at the last remaining shreds of mental stability, and he insists that I behave rationally.

Because, you see, the thing I didn't explain in that story linked to above was this:  After I completely destroyed my hair with the always-disastrous home hair coloring kit, and after I stared at my hair for what seemed like hours in the mirror, mumbling incoherently, and AFTER I tied my hair up in a scarf to go to sleep, just so that I wouldn't have to look at it anymore and could therefore pretend that it hadn't happened, Cody tried to rationalize with me.

"Why are you sleeping in that scarf?" he asked.

"Because.  I have to.  Don't talk to me about it.  I can't look at my hair," I responded.

"But you'll be sleeping,"  he reasoned.

"I CAN'T!  DON'T MAKE ME TAKE IT OFF!  I CANNOT TAKE IT OFF!"  I screamed, as an insane woman might.

"Ummm....ok.  Why don't we take a deep breath and count to ten?" Cody suggested.

"No!  No....please don't make me count to ten," I begged. 

For some reason, when I get really upset, my brain puts every bit of normal conversation into the "demand" category.  I always end up pleading with people not to make me do whatever it is that they might have just randomly said.  For example, you might say, Elise, I'm hungry.  I think I'll make a sandwich.  And I would respond with something reasonable like Nooooo!  Don't make me eat.  Please don't make me eat a sandwich.  It's lovely.  Wanna hang out sometime?

"Well, let's just count to ten.  Ok?  We're gonna count to ten.  Ready?"  Clearly, we hadn't been married long at this point.

"No!" deep breath "No!!  Noooo.  Ok.  Okaaay..."  I tried to harness my completely out of control brain.

"Good, here we go!  One.....two... count, Elise."

"Threee......f-f-ouuuurr...." at this point I broke down into tears.

"Umm....ok!  That's enough counting!  Uh, Elise?"  Cody had not ever seen me cry, to this point.  And I'm crying about my hair, of all things.  And counting to ten.

So, when I reminded Cody about the hair story, known around these parts as "Remember When You Made Me Count To Ten" he let up on the whole THREE YEAR vs. TWO YEAR thing.  He's gonna let me have it.  And I'm taking the word, and making it mine.  Three.  Third!  Thrice! 

It's much better than two.

So celebrate for me tonight!  Have three drinks.  Or three desserts.  Three of something, anyway.  We all deserve it.

Post Number 300: Sleep Deprivation! Also, I'm A Whiner

So here we are.  And it's raining again.  Of course it is.

This has been the summer of rain; monsooning all day and night, washing away gardens, lawns, and, most recently, trees.  The lakes, which last summer were perilously low and dry, are now overflowing into yards, covering docks and boathouses, washing away ladders and tires and other boat-dock amenities, and even going as far as to lift boats completely out of their slips and have them float aimlessly around boathouses or, in some cases, the lake itself.

I've been informed, by people who have found their boats recently floating a half mile down the way, that they are unamused by this development.

Myself, I'm unamused by the fact that the entire back half of my house is starting to wash away, down into the yard.  Also by the fact that any time the sun comes out everyone immediately runs outside and simultaneously starts doing All Their Outdoor Projects!  And they try and cram them all into the 2.3 hours of sunlight per week we're currently enjoying!  And they overcrowd all the parks and the pools and the lakes (which no one is allowed on anyway because of all the floating debris) and then nobody has any fun because we're all bumping into someone else, any way we turn.

So, in other words, I'll complain about anything, and if it wasn't raining continually it would be 105 degrees with 96% humidity and I would be on here, asking who in their right mind would choose to live somewhere that feels like a large, steaming bowl of soup.  Once I was reading a travel site, and they were doing a feature on the best places to travel for specific seasons.  And conversely, the worst places to travel during specific seasons.  They said something like this about the region I currently call home:

Avoid these southern locales during the summer months.  The temperatures are extreme, and only the locals can stand to be there.

I beg to differ.

Anyway, we just celebrated the Fourth of July.  And it was raining!  Surprise!  We did actually get one good day of almost no rain, and everyone was so thrilled that we literally did not know what to do.  I think something about all this rain is messing with people's circadian rhythms, their sleep/wake cycles, or both.

Because every night, from last Friday night until this Thursday night, the Fourth of July revelers who were residing at our house saw in the sunrise before they felt like going to bed.  And what I want to know is, what the hell is wrong with everyone?

We're not 18 years old.   Not any of us.  In fact, I am one of the younger members of this group, at the not-so-young age of 26.  And while I'm fine with pulling an all-nighter or two if it's absolutely necessary...well, no.  I'm not, actually.  I hate all-nighters, and I think I pretty much always have.  However, I WILL do an all-night affair if I absolutely must, but in this case, I just wasn't feeling it.  The first night, which was last Friday night, was ok.  Everyone had just gotten in, some from across the country.  We hadn't all been together in quite some time, and hey!  It wasn't raining.  So we sat out on the screen porch sipping drinks or inside playing the Wii and whiled the night away.  Until 6:30am.  Well, I thought.  That was interesting!  I bet we're all happy we got that night in, and now everyone is going to be sufficiently tired and chilled out the rest of the week, as is befitting the Fourth of July at the lake.

But no!  This was not to be.  Because the next night found me sitting somewhere, I don't even remember where, at 4:30am, trying desperately to hold my eyes open and trying even harder to remember why I was trying at all.  Vague hospitality-centered notions such as hosting and making sure my guests were having a good time worked for a while, but as 5am rounded the corner I decided that I really didn't care about anyone anymore, and went to bed. 

By Sunday, I was looking at everyone suspiciously, wondering if they were actually human, or some kind of robot-species that didn't need sleep at all.  By Monday, I irritably started asking people if they didn't have jobs, or somehow were looking forward to a week's vacation where they would catch up on all their missed sleep before starting back at normal life.  By Tuesday I was hovering somewhere between violent anger, complete despondency, and bitter tears.  All it took to set me off was to ask me something innocent like whether or not I felt like going to the movies later on that night, or what the plan might be for the next day.  Don't you people have any heart?  I would sob.  I'm not a rockstar.  I have to sleep.  Why do you all hate me?

And somehow, everyone else seemed to be fine, making their plans, staying up until all hours of the early morning, sipping their drinks, and generally enjoying life.  I, on the other hand, couldn't stop thinking about how tired I was, how I was going to have to get up in just a few hours and somehow face an entire day and night of Doing Things, and how once the holiday was over, I was going to have to go straight back to work and, well.  Work.  And I'd be tired!  Who could bear it?

I've always been this way.  Nothing infuriates me more than knowing that I have to get up early the next morning and yet being forced to stay up late the night before, wasting precious hours of sleep doing, well, anything.  There's almost nothing in the world that I would rather be doing than sleeping.

So, there it is!  I would rather sleep than do anything else.  What does that make me?  Chronically depressed?  A hibernating bear?  Not the life of the party, it would seem, at the very least.

To make matters worse, I had to go straight to Los Angeles very early Thursday morning for a market.  That meant I had to leave my house at about 3:30am on Thursday morning, when I had only been to bed a few hours before at (very early for the week, mind you!) 1:30am or so.  I arrived in LA at 8:50, and then had to, you know.  Work.  I don't know what I'm trying to accomplish here, by continuing on about this.  It's almost as if I expect that next time I type in a sentence about how I was really tired and then had to get up and do things, it's actually going to sound impressive, or, you know, unlike things that everyone else does all the time.

You know, Judy, today I got up, somehow managed to find clothes in the wardrobe, put them on, and then did the laundry AND the dishes!  Then, I vacuumed and dusted and somehow managed to eat lunch, all before 2pm.  Whew!  Can you believe me?  I hardly can!

So to sum up, I get tired easily, enjoy my sleep, and dislike it intensely when it's interrupted.  Groundbreaking, really.

Here's something, though!  On the flight back from LA, I was still tired (shocking!), and was hoping to maybe sleep a bit on the plane.  However, I was stuck in an aisle seat, and the lady across from me in the other aisle seat was...well...large.  Spilling over the sides of her seat large.  And while I will give all sorts of credence to the point that airline seats are ridiculously small and can be easily compared to the stalls they cram cattle into, she was still taking up quite a bit of room.  So, anytime anyone needed to walk down the aisle, they had to edge right up to my seat, which meant that if I had any body part, say, my elbow or pinky finger, sticking out of my tiny area of space, someone was going to run into me.  And since directly next to me, in the middle and window seats, sat a happy, snuggling couple, I really didn't have much breathing room at all.  And therefore I didn't think sleep was happening, as such.  However, after a while I did start that whole nodding off and catching yourself thing, where I was sitting straight up in my seat and would suddenly find, due to my chin hitting my chest, that my head had stopped supporting itself and instead was letting gravity take over.  This happened a couple of times until my head stopped supporting itself and decided to roll precariously to the left and land directly on the shoulder of the male counterpart of the happy, snuggling couple.  Who, more than likely, were less happy to be suddenly sharing their snuggling with a random travel companion.  I woke with a start, and immediately removed my head from his shoulder.  He looked at me strangely, and I looked at him horrified, and instead of doing anything normal at all, I patted his shoulder a few times and said, Sorry! Sorry!

I then turned to face the seat in front of me, cheeks burning, and closed my eyes, hoping that maybe if I pretended I didn't care, I wouldn't.  Also I cursed everyone who had made me stay up so late all those nights in a row and obviously were the cause of such an embarrassing situation.  So if you're one of those people, and you're reading this, be warned.  You don't even want to know the curses I wished upon you on that airplane.  You don't even want to know.

This Post Has A Double Purpose

1. To apologize in advance.  Much like business traveling seems fun when you're not the one doing it, getting spammed in your comments section always seemed like it would be cool.  Like if I was getting spam, well, then I'd obviously made it in the blog world!  However, this is not true, on any level.  So I had to turn the little comment validation text box thing on.  I hate that thing.  I hate it on all of your pages, you with the popular blogs who need it to keep the robots from spamming you endlessly.  I get the use, but I hate having to squint at the screen and go "is that a v?  No, I think it's an r....hmmm."  So anyway, I'm sorry about it.  Blame the freaking Viagra robots.

2.  To say that my next post will be post number 300.  Yay!  How exciting.  It better not suck, right?  I better think of something really great, to do the number justice, to do my readers justice, to thank everyone for reading along with me all the way to the great number of 300.

Great.   Now it's totally gonna suck.