Then I got Fenwick, and he seemed kind of goofy and stupid, but he started playing fetch, too. So I’m thinking, wow, I raise really smart cats.

But then a friend mentioned that hers plays fetch, too. And someone else said the same thing. Now I think they’re just evolving.

I sleep with one eye open.

It’s a nice, breezy day - the Breeders are performing at McCarren pool this afternoon, but I’ll be over on Smith Street taking part of the Bastille Day festivities.

I’ve been socking away commission checks like a paranoid doomsdayer, but I’ve decided to dip into it and change around a few things in the living room and the bed room.

First to go is the off-white rug I got a few months ago. Within half a week, Jack had already vomited on it a handful of times. I’d never seen him do anything like that, with that frequency. Certainly not on the blue and brown striped rug in the hall, or the astro-turf flor rug under my desk, or the hundreds of square feet of hardwood flooring throughout the rest of the apartment. He choose the off-white rug for the same reason that Fenwick ignored my cheaper cotton shifts and sturdy wool garments, not to mention his scratching post, and chose the three silk chiffon dresses in my closet to shred: Murphy’s Law.

I just need to find the right vomit-colored rug. The off-white rug will be professionally cleaned and moved to my bedroom, but I have a feeling Jack, and Jack’s hairball, will find their way.

On the long subway ride back to Brooklyn, I did some more thinking, and decided to look into swimming again. I used to be a fairly avid swimmer, hitting the pool three to five times a week - a habit I picked up in Paris during the summer months between classes, when I was broke and bored and the pool pass was an easy-to-swallow 100 francs a month. A few years later in New York, I think I stopped swimming during that terrible emotional mudslide when I lost interest in pretty much everything. Still digging out of that one, I guess.

After some cursory research, I think I’m going to try out the Stuyvesant High pool which is open to the public on nights and weekends with extended hours during July and August. My basic criteria of a single train, no transfer commute (v. important) and ostensibly clean and reputable (somewhat important) have been met. Developing…

I hate these abominations! Flash is like pork belly - used sparingly and judiciously, it got a nice “wow” factor, but a meal of only pork belly? Ok, bad example….

thoughts?

Sigh.

Internet: i’m so over you.

Last night, I successfully navigated a sushi dinner with a friend. No beer, no sake, even though the waitress was kinda pushy: “Hot sakeeee? So cold out!…..You sure?”

Goddamnit woman, just back the fuck off!

When I thought my friend wasn’t looking, I managed to slip a few packets of low-sodium kikkoman into my oversized fashion bag. My mal-purposed intention was (obvs) soy sauce shooters in the privacy of the overly-sweet scented lavatory. But my friend’s got eyes in the back, side, top of his head and he damanded that I hand them over.

Fine. Killjoy.

Without cable TV, I watched ONCE (sweet! cute! adorable!) and then spent a few hours pretending to read the exhaustive New Yorker profile of the recently deposed O’Neal, while snipping at split ends. I’m determined to regain my status as a nerd of the first degree, but how does one un-fry an egg?

3 am: the Witching Hour

Crisis. I was hurtled awake by a nagging anxiety in the pit of my tum, and I needed to annihilate it. Normally, I’d take a nip (or 4 or 5) of bourbon from the night-flask I keep in a hollowed out copy of Motherless Brooklyn at bed’s side, but clearly that violates the Great Detox plan. And besides, I made quick work of my reserves just before I decided to give up hooch. Irony alert: I was inebriated when I decided to go sober. I’m so complex!

So, I did what any responsible, but sleepless adult would do.

Make chamomile tea with milk and turn a few pages on Catch-22? What the hell is wrong with you? C’mon. Think.

I raided my pig bank to rustle up some scratch for a few cans of mad dog (old dog?) some dog, whatever, and some cheddar flavored bugles. After sinking those bad boys, I sourced my bathroom for the last of the nyquil mixed with the last of the ‘tussin and dropped a klonopin. But before passing out somewhere in the middle of a pile of cat hair, dust mites, and empties, I forgave myself this minor setback. Self-love & forgiveness of one’s transgressions, according to the Four Agreements, is key to self actualization.

Love to you on this most blessed of days.

But other than that - no TV.

But I’m quirky! In this case “quirky” is a euphemism for borderline personality with a lose grip on anger management, tempered with bouts of mania and a bizarre affinity for self-deprecation and French cheese. Being quirky was fine when I could deftly sublimate this gross character flaw, and use sarcasm and satire to deal with my anger, instead of using anger to deal with my anger.

[redacted sentimental bullshit]

I do this a lot - the reckless episode, the guilt, the reprisal of values and self-worth, the hollow declarations of change, the slacking off with the casual attitude, the reckless episode… Pathological. Up to this point, I’ve been living a farce. Ridiculous. Sham. But I can’t give up hope, we can’t lose hope. So fuck it: I’m going cold turkey for the next 30 days. No booze, no TV, no junk food, no negative thoughts or words (or as few as possible), no being a shit, no being lazy.

According to a friend’s research on the topic, it takes 30 days to form a habit. 30 days to change your life. Plus, imagine what kind of hot little body I’ll be rocking come May 1.