"Painting the basement": sounds like a euphemism, but is meant 100% literally.

I was in a good mood, but then I got online (and heaven knows I'm miserable now--okay I will turn off the damn Smiths, they're doing nothing for my mood). Somehow the mere fact of turning on the dratted machine instantly got me back in the mental dead zone that results from endless hours spent refreshing the same websites--and that was before I even opened Firefox.

Otherwise I have had a very nice offline day. Got up obscenely early to go for a walk at Widewater before it got too hot, then came back and painted the basement. Well, to be specific, swept up five years' worth of dust and knocked five years' worth of crud and cobwebs from the walls, covered the floor, went to the hardware store for the insta-patch mortar you can use to fill little holes in the walls, then sometime in the afternoon I finally went at it with the whitewash. Only got two walls done before dinnertime, but at least the prep work is done and tomorrow I can just paint without scraping spiders off the cinderblock or dealing with the horrid 50-year-old insulation someone wedged haphazardly into the rafters.

I think the activity might be helping fend off a depressive slump, but getting online just activates all the neural pathways that are tied to me sitting there like a zombie, which is why I feel crappy when I turn on the computer. Argh, I should just log off and go read more of Perdido Street Station. I'm finally getting to the good part and the body count is getting impressive.

Clothing sale coming... soonish. I did manage to come by a little bit of money, but extra cash is always nice and I do need to clean out my closet (and desk, and bookshelves).

"Painting the basement": sounds like a euphemism, but is meant 100% literally.

I was in a good mood, but then I got online (and heaven knows I'm miserable now--okay I will turn off the damn Smiths, they're doing nothing for my mood). Somehow the mere fact of turning on the dratted machine instantly got me back in the mental dead zone that results from endless hours spent refreshing the same websites--and that was before I even opened Firefox.

Otherwise I have had a very nice offline day. Got up obscenely early to go for a walk at Widewater before it got too hot, then came back and painted the basement. Well, to be specific, swept up five years' worth of dust and knocked five years' worth of crud and cobwebs from the walls, covered the floor, went to the hardware store for the insta-patch mortar you can use to fill little holes in the walls, then sometime in the afternoon I finally went at it with the whitewash. Only got two walls done before dinnertime, but at least the prep work is done and tomorrow I can just paint without scraping spiders off the cinderblock or dealing with the horrid 50-year-old insulation someone wedged haphazardly into the rafters.

I think the activity might be helping fend off a depressive slump, but getting online just activates all the neural pathways that are tied to me sitting there like a zombie, which is why I feel crappy when I turn on the computer. Argh, I should just log off and go read more of Perdido Street Station. I'm finally getting to the good part and the body count is getting impressive.

Clothing sale coming... soonish. I did manage to come by a little bit of money, but extra cash is always nice and I do need to clean out my closet (and desk, and bookshelves).