Life's Recent Cherries and Pits: (An Admittedly Eclectic Selection)

Good Things That I Remember From The Last Few Days:

-Seeing the result of hours of work: a clean(er) house
-Spending time on a cooperative project with Josh
-Laughing together in the car on the way back from the dump ("I did it! I outsmarted my Dad!")
-Truly one of the finest deli sandwiches I have ever had the pleasure of eating (triple decker: roast chicken breast with swiss on dutch crunch with everything on it, from a cool little old German deli called, I kid you not, "Munchen Haus")
-At the end of a day full of grubby work and hassle, an unexpected date night--dinner and a movie! (Thanks J & J!)
-Eating a huge double scoop choco-mint waffle cone while laughing my ass off at Shrek 2 and snuggling with my honey in an almost empty theater
-Having a calm, pleasant and enjoyable dinner with my dad, aunt, and uncle after yet another day spent dealing with Archer chaos
-Hearing good news about family rifts that seem to be finally healing (my Dad and his Mom)
-The momentary high and feeling of excitement and confidence that coffee gives me after the first cup or so
-Getting complimentary (and helpful!) emails from complete strangers who have agreed to read and critique my novel in progress
-Hanging with the writing group gals--always so supportive, and so interesting and entertaining in their own right that I almost forgot how frustrated and stuck I was
-Meeting someone new and having sparky conversation about writing and life
-Gazing moonily (yet surreptitiously) at the angel-faced girl who works at the Applebox--she'll get her own blog entry one of these days
-Processing stoopid family shit and being able to laugh about it with dear old friends
-Eli saying "I love you Mama" over and over
-Eli's little face lighting up in a smile and him saying "Mama! Mama!" when he first sees me after an absence
-Feeling like I'm kicking ass and taking names at work, because even though I'm super busy and it's stressing me out, I'm feeling competent and appreciated
-Bonding with my new co-worker
-Talking on the phone with/seeing my Mom, finally back from her fabulous 3 week vacation in Paris--I really really missed her
-Making plans with buddies to meet up in NYC for chocolate martinis or dinners or massages at funky spas where little Asian ladies walk on your back with their therapeutic toes

Bad Things That I Remember (But Would Like to Forget) About the Last Few Days:

-Cleaning the Archer House: Dirt, soap scum, nasty goopy hairballs the size of my fist pulled out of the shower drain, nicotine sludge scrubbed off peeling wallpaper, emptying Joanne's ripe bedpan, breathing secondhand smoke in an enclosed room with a crazy mother-in-law while trying to stack old Rolling Stones magazines ("somebody might want that someday...some collector") neatly in banker boxes, the utterly nasty rank rotten smell of the dump
-Being totally frustrated and stuck with writerly issues and fear about not knowing where my novel is going, along with psyching myself up into actual anxiety attacks about the stuckedness rather than taking a deep breath and letting the field be fallow for awhile, without judgement
-Working way too hard and getting way too stressed out trying to prep for a major trade show, train a new person, close deals, solve problems, and juggle an increasing overall workload
-Migraines and other unpleasant physical side-effects of stress showing up in my body
-Kid tantrums ("stop it! STOP IT! I don't LIKE you anymore!") and a general increase in bratty behavior
-The kid peeing in his bed (so that I have to change the sheets at some ungodly hour of the morning)
-The kid peeing in my bed (so that I have to change the sheets at some ungodly hour and then go sleep on the couch cos my mattress and comforter are wet and smell like a combination of pee and Nature's Miracle)
-Cleaning up cat barf after an already fucked up night spent dealing with cleaning up after the kid's bedwetting
-Allergies acting up (or is that just another one of those pesky stress symptoms?)
-Getting a letter in the mail from a law firm with an inventory of all my grandparents' possessions in it, saying they want me and all the other heirs to "put our names next to the things we want"--sad and depressing on so many levels
-Worrying about my brother having been laid off
-Not getting enough sleep, never getting enough sleep...and blowing off my BIC early morning writing time in hopes of getting enough sleep to "try it again tomorrow"

Ok fine. I think I'll go to bed now. :) I can always update this later.