Progress Report

Book: Stalled at 28,000 words. Had to have a break to regain some perspective. Will place on so-called "back burner" until a couple weeks into the semester.

Semester: Throwing together first-day handouts and deciding which essays and poems to have my classes read. One that made the cut is David Foster Wallace's "Consider the Lobster." I highly recommend it. Very bizarre, and the fact that it first appeared in Gourmet magazine makes it even better. It is not exactly up their generally snobby alley.

Alley: The back alley of my brain has come out to take over. Every obscure thing I have ever feared or dwelled on or downright obsessed over is coming to visit me each night as I try to sleep.

Sleep: You know what's really really hard? Coming off an addiction to Ativan. Have been on this bullshit drug off and on for 29 years. Way more off than on it. I would sometimes go a whole year without having one. In this past year, since moving, I've taken it every night to help me sleep. This was a mistake. A very big one. The recently developed side effects now include the nighttime sensation of my skin crawling, increased panic (from a frakkin anti-anxiety drug?), inability to focus on anything for longer than

--wait. What were we talking about?

About: It's all about getting off this drug now. I am just now trying to wean down and the stories online about this are nightmarish. Seizures, for instance. I'll probably have to go on something else just to deal with the loud sighting of Ship Panic on the horizon, with all its cannons blasting.

Blasting: I feel like blasting a cap in Candy's ass for being so dense and getting addicted to a drug. I guess I just didn't believe that whole thing about "dependency." My bad.

Bad: Life, though, is not bad. It is good. I soak in all the good stuff I can, like love, and put out as much as I can find inside myself. Heh. I just said I put out.