2004-11-08
What a day. I look like ass, I smell like ass, and how I feel is acutely comparable to how I look and smell. I'm a walking "before" picture.It's a side effect of this past weekend at Mizzou, where my students made me just about the most disgustingly proud I've ever been of them. Finalists in all three formats of debate and multiple individual events trophies. How great is that?!
Unfortunately, I got a grand total of seven hours of sleep between Thursday and Saturday, and the sickness and fatigue is yet to subside.
Unfortunately, my kidney still hurts where Rob, everybody's favorite poster boy for tolerance, punched it a week ago on election night when the Flordia results came in. I've spent the entire week clutching my back and walking around like a whiny, attention-starved octagenarian. A trip to health services may be in order, but my morbid fear of doctors warrants otherwise. So that's nice.
Unfortunately, I drank too much Thursday night and made a fool of myself.
Unfortunately, my hair is falling out, or so I irrationally fear. 22 years old and already wondering if I need to pick up some Rogaine. Damn you mother for passing your hypochondria along to me! Damned dirty genetics! Incidentally, my hair looks like crap today. The long dormant cowlick in the back of my head has chosen today of all days to spring up like a mushroom from manure, which looks ridiculous, though is hardly my mother's fault.
Unfortunately, I quit my office job today. More on that one when I don't feel so drained.
Amid all this chaos, I spent the lunch hour before work in a small Chinese restaurant near campus, in which I sat at the table by the window nursing tea and reading Dave Eggers' new short story collection. The profoundly moving story that I took in over General Tso's chicken was called "Notes for a Story of a Man Who Will Not Die Alone," which are the notes for a story about a man with bone cancer who arranges to quietly die in a baseball stadium draped in white sheets while surrounded by thousands of strangers. Highly recommended. I chose this lunch spot because I was the restaurant's sole patron, as predicted, and the small lady who spoke shaky English didn't care about my hair. While I ate, I stared out the window and could have sworn that I saw Edward Scissorhands speed by in a Chevy Malibu. There is no better a local hiding place.
Now I'm once again taking refuge in the computer lab, feeling comfort looking around and observing all of the other lab occupants with worse hair than mine. Eventually I'll make my way out, but I'm still a little timid about the prospects of leaving my seat.
It's one of those days.
-Andy