Wednesday, February 02, 2005

Non-sequiturs

Not to get all journal on you, but gosh, I've been working hard lately. At work-work as they call it. There's good work and there's work-work - which can sometimes be good-work but is more likely work-work or bad-work. I think the dashes are crucial. Work-work is never BAD work nor GOOD work. It is only every so often good work which is to say no dash and no capitalization. Sadly, work-work can also get in the way of good work like blogging which is not GOOD work but is definitely more often good work. Sometimes I get scared to write in the blog because I fear it's going to be bad-work or bad work or BAD work. But anyway, there's been a lot of work-work lately. Every year around Oscar time it gets busy at my job and I start to sweat at weird times in unusual places.

Like now, I am sweating on the upper right side of my stomach. It's cool - even clammy. I drink more coffee at work-work and I certainly enjoy it less than I do when I am drinking coffee doing good or GOOD work.

I have funny anxiety dreams when I am doing too much work-work. Two nights ago, I dreamed that I had bought an Apple Mini AND been given an Apple Mini by my parents and I was struggling to articulate to them how they shouldn't feel bad for the gift because two Apple Minis are even more useful than one. I think in my dream I was sweating in unusual places too. Is under my knee an unusual place to sweat? The back of my knee. That was clammy in my dream. Seriously. I could not actually articulate the value of two Apple minis and kept making a bad joke about how I could use them to skate with. My parents did not understand this and when I looked back on this dream, I do not understand it either.

The idea of having a lot of Apple Minis is appealing to me. Just like when I go to the Apple site, I secretly yearn for eMacs and U2-engraved ipods. These things would officially not make my life better. But in my own tip of the hat to our consumer economy, I desire them. Apple officially has me under their influence. I crave their clean, stark but user-friendly design.

Speaking of impulses, missing an L train the other day aroused a curious feeling in me. As I walked up the platform against the direction of the train leaving the station, I felt the urge to hold out my hand and slap the conductor as he went by. Not so much slap him but since the conductor was leaving his head exposed and the train was in motion, he would be slapping his head into my hand. Don't worry, I didn't follow through on this urge. But I think it was the tilt of his head and inability to respond after such an act - not to mention a long sweaty day of work - that made such mischief appealing.

This is the kind of point I usually make at a party after a series of successful jokes. People are laughing and everyone's trading stories and I tell a couple good ones and people keep laughing and then I recount my impulse to slap the train conductor (who arguably has one of the more stressful jobs around) and everyone stops and stares at me aghast and I curse myself for pushing my luck.

More train news: A conductor the other day closed the doors of the L train and then told everyone that we were going directly from Union Square to Bedford Avenue. There was a lot of cursing and fidgeting in close quarters as people realized they were going to have to get to First Ave. by way of Brooklyn. A curious tactic on the part of the conductor to be sure. But also, I never realized so many people took the subway from Union Square to First Avenue. It's just four blocks. No, no... It wasn't even that cold.

Lastly I recommend digging one's four-wheel drive car out of a giant snowdrift about halfway and then crashing through the remainder of the snow in dramatic fashion. Your girlfriend will be mildly but not really impressed.

I am glad Chris Rock is hosting the Oscars. He is funny.

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