A man named Israel keeps calling my house asking for Dan. He leaves voice mail on my machine in a hurried, nervous voice. Yesterday someone called my cell phone and left an angry voice mail in a different language. I'm terribly popular with strangers these days.

Yesterday wasn't a walk in the park, but it wasn't a walk in a stinky alley, either. And today has felt very fluid, with time flowing in such a way that five minutes and an hour seem the same. Occasionally I feel like I'm floating through the week. Whether this is a result of odd sleeping patterns or getting mellow in my old age, I cannot decide.

11.08.00
Some election, eh?

Yesterday I finished a memoir about heroin called "How to Stop Time." I'm not sure what to think. Thankfully, it's not another alarmist Nancy Reagan-ish diatribe -- but at the same time, it seems like the writer is detached from her experience... she nonchalantly mentions that she started snorting every day, she makes great points about capitalism but glides over her own family's affluence, and if only she'd expanded on sections about police treatment of white versus black heroin users. Still, it's probably difficult to write about, and overall it's a pretty interesting read.

This is so seventh grade, but I am getting all worked up about my big adventure with sushi-pants in two weeks. We're going to paint the town red, or at least walk around in sweaters and mittens. It's funny how it's taken three years for us to finally meet, and funnier still how I feel like it's a reunion with an old friend.

My horoscope said that today is going to be "no walk in the park." But Mercury is going direct, which means that its retrograde status is gone for now (yay!). I don't know why, but today I feel like something good is about to happen. Fingers are crossed. Actually, my legs are -- which is kinda weird because I'm usually one to curl up in a ball or stretch my legs out. Unfocused and yours, I remain.