An herbal clutch for runaway brains

Ye gods, today I got sucked into a work spiral for a volunteer thing.

So I manage events for National Novel Writing Month in Boston, and today was the day I was going to update the store.  We have a former participant, a real lady, who makes us "Noveling Buddies" — small handcrafted toys — that we sell in the store and that are probably our primary moneymaker.  So as part of the store prep, I got to:

• Set up a seamless backdrop, check lighting, and photograph 20-plus small toys.
• Download and edit those pictures.
• Retake a couple.
• Lather, rinse, repeat.
• Create 20-plus discrete listings.

This is all easy enough to do, but time consuming simply for the number of steps.  Then I realized that there were some other things on the website that needed updating.  Then I inventoried other products and added them to the store.  Revising documentation for this year, making signs, etc., and 12 hours later, I'm zonked.  

Except, of course, there is more stuff to do.  Which ... well, FUCK.

A few puffs of my favorite herb doesn't stop me from thinking.  It does make me a little spinny-aroundy, in that I can't organize myself to do stuff, though.  And shit is funnier when I'm toking.  I think it acts like a clutch for my brain; it can still spin, but my body doesn't feel compelled to follow it intently.  I did just manage to be responsible enough to update my to-do list with some of the new stuff I needed to get done, and thankfully, it's not a terrible lot to do.  At least, I don't think it is.  Last time I thought that, I was just going to snap some photos and make some listings ... 

Regardless, I'll go to bed and won't have to fool around with this again until tomorrow.  Well, after I finish the popcorn I'm totally going to make after I press "publish."  

Or maybe baked beans.  

Formless thoughts

So it's been a long week, Mercury was in retrograde (which means I don't understand shit about astrology), and I came home and decided to have a puff or two of my favorite semi-illicit substance.

And ... well, nothing much happened.

I was told by a friend on Facebook with whom I was chatting that my chat style doesn't change demonstrably when I'm half-baked. This should possibly stir some grave doubts in me about how I sound while sober, but I'll forget about it until I re-read this blog. Which, by the way, I've vowed not to copyedit or correct later. (Which explains the heinous misspelling in the last post.)

Fortunately, unlike Wednesday, I didn't have anything important to get done before bed, so this was just me using it as a relaxation and sleep aid.

And I just realized that my other friend, who said I "... turn into a paranoid professional organizer when you're stoned," was right.  Well, except for the stoned part — I only took a couple of puffs off my vape, really!  I was looking at this blog post and thinking it was kind of formless and directionless.  While I didn't think it until a second ago, and in jest, "what this blog post needs is a bullet list!"  Which would have been funnier if I'd thought it when I didn't.  

I think my stream of consciousness just petered out.

I was chatting on Facebook and it seemed to me that either I was typing really fast or there was a distinct lag on the site.  Which seems more likely to you?  Yeah.  Site lag.  But hey, this blog proves good for something other than me babbling.  (Unless that comes off all babbly.  How should I know?)

When productivity goes up in smoke.

Today's life lesson:  Don't smoke/vape if you have shit to do that requires executive function skills.

What I needed to do before bed tonight:  

• Edit photographs for the NaNoBoston Store.  (Long story short, I fundraise for National Novel Wriitng Month).
• Update the inventory for the store.
• Send an email.  
• Catch up on some email correspondence.
• Download copy of Ubuntu and burn a boot disc to see if I can resurrect a computer with no OS installed (Win 7 upgrade to 10 gone wrong).

What I actually did tonight:

• Opened Facebook.  
• Saw that there are pictures of Justin Bieber naked in Bora Bora floating around the Interwebs.  Debated in my own mind whether to go look for them or not.  Really debated.  It's wrong to do it, yes.  Even if he's a douchebag, he doesn't deserve the invasion of his privacy.  But hey, those adverts that were supposed to have been Photoshopped to enhance his package are out there, and this might be my only chance to see if they were real or not.  But it's wrong, even if he is sort of hot in a half-douchey, half-molesty way.  Ended up not looking, despite engrossing curiosity about what he's packing.  This whole thing probably took an hour of thinking.
• Patted myself on back for doing the right thing even when doing the wrong thing would effectively be free of consequences.  Strained myself being self-congratulatory for having good judgement and morals even when a little high.  Went back and forth about why lowering inhibitions shouldn't be a reason to lower morals or standards.  
• Thought about this poor neglected blog.

TL:DR version:  

• Needed to do lots.
• Actually did jack shit.  (And did so in a rambling way.)

Where does she get those God-awful jumpers? And are they mixed natural and synthetic fibers?

Today's Slightly Altered Reality is brought to you courtesy of two lemon drops from Cheesecake Factory.  

Saw on MSNBC that the "Oath Keepers" are providing a "security detail" to Kim Davis.  For once, I'm not sure who to cheer for.  There has to be some overlap -- possibly significant -- between the #BlueLivesMatter crowd and the Oath Keepers crowd, so if shots are fired, I fully expect cognitive dissonance and its concominant idiocy to make the Internet a hatefully entertaining place for a few days.  

Kim Davis ... it's tough for me to fathom what's going on in her head.  I do believe she's perfectly sincere in her beliefs, and she does display the zeal of the recently converted.  That she doesn't understand the role she is expected to play in the government baffles me.  If her faith is that strong, and she leaves her job in order to live her faith more completely, won't God provide for His faithful servant?  Or maybe she thinks God is too parsimonious to pony up the $80k/year she's making, possibly relegating her to the $13k/year median income of the county where she lives?  Maybe her flavor of fundamentalist protestantism is something akin to Prosperity Gospel?  I really don't know.  

And though I can't appearance shame in good conscience, girlfriend and her husband both need a visit with Trinny and Suzannah.  (Is that show still on the air?)

(In other news, just deleted several paragraphs that revealed secrets not mine to reveal.  Not about Kim Davis, who seems to have no secrets.)

Some other random thoughts I don't have the time to expound upon properly:  

1.  I wish there were an Arbys closer to Boston.  I could murder a roast beef sandwich, and it would be a damn sight better than this overpriced and heaping pile of food Cheesecake Factory offers.

2.  I wish this software on the iPad let me properly format a numerical list.

3.  I really am a lightweight when it comes to alcohol.  I hope my coworkers don't notice when I stagger in to work.  (Or that they understand that certain of them, who share a name with a common bird, make showing up slightly tipsy a much more appealing option than stone cold sobriety.)

What the hell was I thinking?

The idea for this — the name "Slightly Altered Reality" — occurred to me while not experiencing altered reality.

At least, not very altered.  A few puffs of a certain herb might be involved.

This may be brilliant.  Your mileage may vary.  The problem is that these brilliant ideas never seem so bright on calm, sober reflection.  What makes me laugh now might not be funny or entertaining later.  I could be the Carrot Top of the Internet.  (Now there is a repulsive thought.)

I even worked out that, should I be too lazy or otherwise disinclined to go all the way into my office to use the computer, I can blog right from my phone if I want to, or my iPad if I feel like sparing my eyesight.  Perfect for the baked blogger with more technology than sense!

Meanwhile, I've become so preoccupied with organizing this entry that any previous brilliance seems to have left the premises.  A possibly-brilliant title as basis for a blog, with no thought to content, does come across as utterly ridiculous.  I'd claim this was unusual, except I once wrote an entire book (The Redneck White Wedding Blues) based solely on the title, with no help from anything more mood altering than a bacon sandwich and a Dr Pepper.  (Side note:  It was a damned good rough draft in the end, so the idea may occasionally have merit.)

Meanwhile, some random thoughts, since the anal-compulsive me insists that things must be organized in some vague manner:

1. There is only one letter's difference between "baked" and "naked," but they don't rhyme.  
2. For the record, I'm fully clothed.
3. The cat loves hanging out with me when I've smoked.  (Or vaped, rather; smoking makes me cough.)
4. I hope I remember this the next time I'm experiencing a slightly altered reality.  (See what I did there?)