Also, It's Freakin' COLD.

So yes, I am alive and well, and I don't think I've gone this long without posting in a long, long time. Mostly this can be traced to our good friend Mr. Depression, who has been kicking my ass in a most unrepentant way for lo these many days now. (I took a week off work, planning to do all sorts of work around my apartment, clear out old clothes and books and whatnot--and all week long I didn't even get out of my pajamas. I slept pretty much the whole week. Feh.)

Fortunately, I have this job thing, where they expect me to show up five times a week or so; so eventually I had to get out of bed and take a shower. Yay for me, I guess. It made me feel a bit better to go to work, at least; not that there's anything much to do, since they still haven't adjusted to having me back after my long exile to Siberia (our other building, where they kept me for half the day for about four months). As much as I hate it, I think I need a routine of some sort, at least until I get myself put back together in some meaningful, semi-permanent way.

And that might actually happen, too, if all these people around me would just stop having kids at me. Squeaky, of course (oh, and it will surprise none of you that Tim is turning out to be exactly the sort of father you thought he would be; I got a call tonight from Squeaky complaining of having to always do everything for the baby, because when Tim's not at school or at his training program, he's out with his friends "thinking". I told her "I think you may be confusing that with another '-inking' word, but whatever.") So Squeaky has her baby, and the cat-abandoning girl has her baby, and Deb is due in February but will likely deliver long before that ("And after all," she said to me the other night on the phone, "who are THEY to tell me my cervix is 'incompetent'? How insulting!" I swear, if she goes into irrevocable Mommyland and we drift apart, I am going to be several MORE kinds of miserable than I already am.) And here is good ol' Gladys, six months shy of 40 and not even the possibility of a kid, even if I was sure I wanted one which I'm pretty sure I DON'T, but I would VERY much like to feel like a normal human being who hasn't COMPLETELY wasted her life. Because that's what it feels like, honestly; I look at where I was ten years ago and it looks a lot like where I am now. I look at where I was fifteen years ago and I would pretty much cut off a limb or two if I could have THAT life back. Regardless, what I have now is what I had at 29, only not really, because somewhere in the middle there I was actually doing reasonably well for myself. Now? Not so much. Not, in fact, at all; I'm aiming for ONE month in which I don't have to borrow money from my mom and/or overdraw my checking account. That's not how I want to live--and really there's no REASON for it. I don't live an extravagant life.

But anyway, that's where I've been; I think I shall stop here for now, as BadCat will not remove his tail from my field of vision for ANY reason, and no amount of persuasion will convince him that there's a better place to sleep than atop my monitor. (Which is how he killed my wireless router; rather than hop down to the floor to have his mighty hairball, he simply leaned over my poor router and let fly. It's past saving, alas.)