2:19

I have the first job interview of my young life scheduled for tomorrow.  On an unrelated note, Xanax should come candy-coated like ibuprofen.

3:10

Navigating the world is a tricky thing for me sometimes because I have difficulty figuring out who wants me to lie to them and who doesn't when nobody just comes right out and says it.

12:28

Guilty Pleasure #4: Buying a new toothbrush once a month.  I know dentists insist that one probably does not need to replace one's toothbrush more than four times per year.  I know this.  And yet, I can't seem to deny myself sparkly, stiff, straight, new bristles when I walk by them at the store.  It's the same deal with new socks.  I'm reasonably certain that if I suddenly found myself rolling in billions, I'd spend most of my fortune on socks and toothbrushes.

9:59

I had a dream last night that I was the sole judge of a centipede handstand contest in Shangri-La.  I'm glad I don't believe in dream interpretation.

9:49

Getting trapped inside during a downpour reminds me that the world doesn't always need our help to make itself clean and new, and if that didn't stir some kind of hope in me, I would feel pretty small and lost.

3:47

I become fixated too quickly, and everything seems to become a reference to one over-exercised point.

2:36

As I've gotten older, I've realized how many of the descriptions of physical reactions to emotional situations that I thought were exaggerations or simple figurative speech have proven themselves to be possible with profound emotion.  Crying from happiness and shaking from fear are the two that come to mind.  I thought unimaginative people were just trying to emphasize a feeling using poetic language.  Now I worry that I haven't been feeling enough.

9:34

Do you know what is more gross than an earwig?  Nothing.  Nothing is more gross than an earwig.  Not even two earwigs.

12:14

Whenever I see stationery for sale, I get overwhelmed by the anxiety that I might have forgotten somebody's birthday or neglected to send a necessary thank you note, and I have to buy every blank card in sight.  It almost never turns out that I have actually forgotten to send a card.  This happened yesterday.

9:46

Buried in the papers at work, I came across someone with the last name "O'Saurus".  I don't see how a person could go through life with a last name like that and not think they were their own special kind of dinosaur.

9:17

Does frequent use of the passive voice reveal a passivity of character or a simple inattention to sentence structure?  These are the things that keep me up at night.

9:01

Apparently I incorrectly assumed that my days of reaching the level of excitement wherein I feel like I might pee myself were over around age six.  After more than a month of searching, I just sent my resume for consideration to the one position I've found that tickles my fancy.  I might pee myself.

10:53

I'm pretty sure I talk to myself much too much to make it in the real world.  Plus, I'm still convinced plants can feel pain.

9:24

I could use a vacation right about now.  Yes, sir, as soon as I have a spare twenty grand laying around I'm taking my dream trip to Iceland, Thailand, Ireland and India.  The two times I've mentioned this idea recently, I've garnered responses of, "Oh!  Like Eat Pray Love!" and I have to choke back my gutteral response of screams.  No, not like Eat Pray Love.  Nothing like it.  In fact, out of spite toward that movie and its incessant and unrelenting advertising, I think I would go on this trip endeavoring to under-indulge, learn absolutely nothing about spirituality and return ten pounds lighter and celibate.  Julia Roberts has ruined the hypothetical vacation I can't afford to take.  Also, her mouth looks like she's been eating live wasps.

4:31

My dad frequently refers to the internet as "FaceSpace" and "MyFace," and he's still a million times better at dealing with technological problems than I am.

11:39

One of my friends drunkenly struggled to remember the word "socks" on the phone last night.  Through a process of describing their function and trying to sound out the word, the closest she got was "foot mittens... shoe mittens... shittens".  I can't stop thinking about shittens.

10:37

I don't like the idea of flirting with all of these companies, talking myself up and pretending as though I think each position with each company is a shining example of ideal employment, only to ultimately select the one that will give me the most money or best benefits.  Applying for jobs makes me feel like a slut.

9:13

As someone with an English degree, there is an unreasonably long list of books I feel ashamed that I have not read.  Usually, these are eighteenth- and nineteenth-century "classics," the vast majority of which I am convinced nobody really likes, but everybody likes to pretend to like.  Thus, last night, I began reading Jane Eyre, not because I have any particular interest, mind you, but purely out of the guilt and terror I feel wondering if I'll ever be quizzed on its overarching themes at a cocktail party.

12:08

Today I asked my father if it is legal when writing a will to assign debt to specific people in the same manner as assigning wealth.  It is not.  A lot of people are dodging a lot of karmic bullets.

8:18

Even though I was never sent to sleep-away camp, I feel the distinct pang of longing to go back to one.

12:31

I just realized that I spend a lot of time picturing what young people I meet will look like when they're elderly.  I don't care if my face looks like leather; I just hope I'm half as fabulous as Zsa Zsa Gabor.

1:01

What ever happened to neon-colored inflatable furniture?  And what the hell is a Silly Band?  I feel old.

10:43

Guilty Pleasure #3: Responding to anonymous, passive-aggressive notes that are clearly not written to me.  Some of the women who work for various other companies in this office building share a refridgerator and frequently bicker about what types of items can be stored inside.  Earlier today, there was a note on the outside of it, stating, "To whomever left the ham sandwich: We'd all appreciate it if this fridge was a Meat-Free Zone".  I left another note: "Clearly not all of us".  Three of them have been arguing quite loudly since then.

9:37

It's really off-putting that a lot of the music I've been listening to since high school is now either getting bastardized in re-mixed rap songs or made into car company jingles.

7:10

I live vicariously through Andrew Zimmern.

10:36

There are certain things I feel I need to acquire in order to start thinking of myself as an adult.  So far, the list goes: tweed blazer, savings account, nude-colored lipstick, nude-colored stockings, French Bulldog, television, driver's license, fine china.

9:15

At work, my desk shares a wall with a feminist therapist who specializes in shouting at men with phobias or, at least, takes on a disproportionate number of men with phobias who want to be shouted at as patients.  All day, I hear her pretending to be the angry mother of fifty-year-old men.  I tried to ignore their voices at first, but they're six feet from me and my headphones only go so loud.   Last year, I even bought a white noise machine and left it outside of her office, but to no avail.
I realize it's invasive, but because my hand is somewhat forced in the matter, I figure I might as well enjoy their stories of childhood worries and traumatic sexual encounters.  Because this is my second summer next to her, I can recognize some of the individual voices and have begun quietly cheering them on through their personal breakthroughs.  I wish eavesdropping on a person's deepest secrets was an acceptable way of getting to know him.

5:06

It probably isn't healthy to have a favorite serial killer.

4:46

It makes me feel special when I receive e-mails from President Obama even though I signed myself up for the mailing list.

11:41

Guilty Pleasure #2: Watching scores of videos of synchronized swimming and water ballet.  It's mesmerizing to watch, and the announcers sound like hypnotists.  I want to be a synchronized swimmer in the worst way.

8:53

Making major life decisions is turning out to be a lot different than just deciding what I want and persuing it.  Maybe that was a naive expectation.  On the other hand, maybe if I dig my old Ouija board out of my room, this won't be a problem anymore.

10:13

I get lonely really easily.  Most of the time I can entertain myself, but that just makes the times I can't devastating.

7:54

Why do we call an escalator by the same name if it's perpetually going down?  This thought has been the heart and soul of my grassroots Descendulator Movement for some time.

6:47

There are nights I can't sleep because I'm wondering what happens to my dream-friends, those faceless people I seem to get to know so intimately over the course of a dream who I realize, upon waking, do not exist.  On these nights, I have to convince myself that they exist outside of just one night, that they are the same ones who inhabit everyone's dreams and that I'll see them again, even if I don't recognize them.

11:51

I still get misty-eyed every time I see the Susan Boyle video.  There.  I said it.

9:19

I'm so repulsed by the circulatory system that I can't even take my own pulse without passing out, but mornings like this make me think that I could learn to love a coffee I.V.

11:58

It seems like Peek-a-Boo prepared most of my generation for a future of codependency and failed relationships.

11:50

Today I received eleven consecutive e-mails from my paternal grandmother.  All of them are titled "Twinkies and Root Beer?" and all of them are blank.  I'm so curious.

10:13

It must be really great to be a weatherman or a scat singer because nobody could ever call you out at your job for being wrong without looking like an ass.  In other news, results of a YouTube search for "scat-singing weatherman" leave something to be desired.

9:26

Sometimes, usually when I'm too drunk, stoned or lazy to spend eight minutes making real pasta, I make a packet of ramen noodles and don't add the flavoring.  Additionally, I've pioneered the art of making open-faced grilled cheese sandwiches in the microwave.  I call it "cheese bread".  Some day, I'll release a cookbook of my lethargic culinary endeavors and make millions.  Until then, I will resign myself to the onslaught of ridicule and disgust of my family.

10:16

If I could have dinner with anyone of my choice, dead or alive, I would either choose Raymond Carver or Jacques Cousteau, and I'm pretty sure, no matter which of them I picked, I'd be so starstruck I wouldn't be able to speak.

7:07

I don't know if this happens to other people, but I get words stuck in my head the same way I get songs stuck in my head.  I just keep repeating them to myself, elongating the vowels.  Today's word?  Teeter-totter.  Last week, it was pico de gallo and kazoo.

5:14

What happened to shared experience?  It seems like a lot of people revel in the distance between themselves and those around them, but we're supposed to be a social species.  I try to connect, but most days, I just feel like Ann Hodges.

1:57

I recently realized that I probably need to stop prefacing hypothetical desires with, "When I grow up..." because I am now technically an adult.  For as much as everyone seemed to want to be older when I was younger, adulthood kind of bites now that I'm actually here.

1:51

Guilty Pleasure #1: Drunkenly watching wedding shows on TV and drowning the brides-to-be in fashion-related insults.  "You're too fat for a mermaid cut!"  "Rhinestones do not make you look glamorous!"  Mmmm...Cabernet Sauvignon.

12:58

Yesterday was a particularly stressful day at work.  Here might be a good time to mention that I am temporarily working for my father.  At approximately two-thirty, he flung open the door to my office, paused a minute and said, "Every time I come in here, you're crying and listening to funk".

10:51

There are two girls who live in my town named Evian and Allegra.  I would never forgive my parents, joke or not.

8:23

I wonder if the average person would be able to tell the difference between a photograph of the surface of the moon and a photograph of the bottom of the ocean.  I'm pretty sure that's what most of Schiele's work was all about.

7:46

Looking for a job makes me realize how unrelated my skills are to one another.  In the past, I've taught fencing and historical swords classes, interned at a severe special needs preschool and done paralegal work.  If I wasn't so sickeningly in love with my boyfriend, I'd look into the necessary steps for becoming a mail-order bride.  I wonder whether I can find someone who'll pay me to eat pizza Lunchables, watch "Antiques Roadshow" for hours on end and sleep till noon because I already have the skills set for such a career.

7:29

I like walking into the bathroom at my office building and finding that the toilet seat is up in the stall I've chosen because it means I was the first one to pee there today.  I don't know what to attribute this feeling to other than my relationship with my dog.

7:24

I want a place to keep track of my thoughts.  Here goes nothing.