I'm better.

I mean, I still don't feel what I would call good. On the plus side I got out of working on the house today, but on the downside I had to go to a conference, where I got worked heap upon me that I'll have to do in my free time and then sat through speakers drawing heavily from the well of empty corporate-speak: networking, thinking outside the box and bad extended metaphors. The triple threat.

On the plus side, I got some money from Mom and Dad to pay off some of my dental bills. On the downside, I still have to wrestle with my insurance, who is going to try to wiggle out of paying even a dime. They are gonna pay, but only so much, and not as much as I was hoping.

On the plus side, the people at Four Star were more than happy to resurface the DVD of "Network" so I could finish watching it. On the downside, part of me feels like Howard -- like I wouldn't mind getting on TV and coolly telling people that I'm having a hard time to coming up with reasons to keep on living.

Kidding of course, don't start planning an intervention or anything. It's only that I moved up here to "get it together," in the grown-up sense. Now that that's starting to fail, I look around and realize I'm not really as happy with my life as I thought I was earlier, presuming that things were just going to fall in line. I'd subscribe to the James and Job morality that suffering is good for your character, but the bad part about having a mind that tears things apart is that it makes you kind of a nihilist. I'm better today only because I'm not like I was last night -- wandering around feeling like doing nothing, not wanting to talk, drink, watch TV or do anything.

What I need most in my life right now is something new to believe in foolishly and wholeheartedly, because everything I've tried before has let me down, either literally or because I eventually desconstructed it and couldn't stomach believing in it anymore.