I've been trying to avoid heated discussions and i haven't participated in any active protests, but each night for the past several months i've been praying for the world before i go to sleep.

I can't watch the news right now. I read a few stories from various folks like cnn.com each day, but i can only take in so much. Even the stories on the local radio are too much, i find myself crying on the way to work if i tune in. A co-worker ended up leaving work early yesterday because she just read one too many articles online while at work and couldn't stop crying. I had fallen asleep in front of the tv last Wednesday and woke up to the sound of bombs, it was like waking from a nightmare only to find that it's half real. Some days it's even too much reading my friends' websites.
(warning, these are all rather long and take some time to read, you may not wish to read them all at once or ever, it's okay)
For instance my girlfriend Sam's rant this Wednesday. Or the Time article that Kim points to this morning from her site. Kim also wrote a lovely little personal essay on her site a while back about coming from a military family and how she reconciles supporting the soldiers while protesting the war. I can't even tell you exactly what Andy was writing about yesterday, but it just made me feel sad.

Mostly i just hope that Glenda and Allen and Dudley and Jodie and Lorena and Cyndi and Mack and Sharman and Ed and Ben and Olive and Theil and Jim and Joanne and Tiffany and Tyce and Matthew and Erin and Sam and Patrick and Ciro (and Ciro's son Matthew who is fighting in Iraq now) and Darlene and Kim and Vera and Samwise and Deb and Gretchen and Andy and Reese and Bob and Gerard and Kate and Rodney and Cindy and Holly and Allan and Ginger and Simon and Ethan and Jamieson and Amanda and Jenn and Tj and Mandy and Buffy and Brett and Ariana and Skye and Ken and Mary and Stewart and Brian and Andi and Hamilton and Allison and Thomas and Ken and Nadine and... there are too many people to mention really, and important ones are still missing from this list... are all safe and healthy and none of us ever have to flee our homes because dangerous people don't like our government. Reading Andy's account of 9/11 still turns my stomach, and despite it's horror, i can't wish that kind of destruction on anyone else even in "revenge."

Maybe that's why, despite all the headaches and craziness, i still want to get my hands on this house in the woods. It's my small way of trying to preserve and create a peaceful spot on this earth where people can come visit when the world gets too crazy.~w

My throat is no longer sore, but i'm an enourmous phlegm factory. I think i was made worse by the mad rush to rent a truck and load three couches and two pianos between rainstorms. Why would i do this? Because despite all attempts at negotiation, in order for the sale to go through the seller insists that my roommate-to-be (his now ex-tenant) is completely off the property with all his stuff by midnight tonight. We had already made arrangements for him to be off the property last week, but were told the large furniture and stuff could stay. Apparently once that was done, it still wasn't good enough. So the seller's real estate agent is actually paying the cost of renting a truck until closing that will store all the stuff off-site. We just had to get it and load it. Crazy. We're both hoping that all the effort that we're putting into this will be worth it in the end once i've moved in and he's moved back in and hopefully neither of us will have to move anywhere again for quite some time.~w

Things are starting to clear up. My throat is less sore, my head less stuffy, but still phlegmy, and the mortgage people have decided to lend me the money to buy the house as long as a couple of improvements are made on the house (which are currently in process). With that, i think i'm going to start the task of packing. I've started the mental packing process already. Checking out which rooms have more "stuff" to pack than others and what can be packed first and other such stuff. Being a pack rat, i have plenty of boxes for moving in the attic. In fact, i think almost all the boxes i moved here with are still here as well as the box for the tv, dvd, etc that need extra care. I wonder if i'll feel settled enough in the new place to finally recycle all those extra boxes i've been storing...~w

I'm still a phlegm phactory today, although my nose doesn't seem to be bothering me. It's all draining down my throat and making it easier to croak than talk. The sun is shining though and flowers and trees are bursting into bloom. I want to sit outside and soak up sun rather than work in my office today. I kinda feel like i'm in the calm between storms for a brief moment and need to take as much time to sit around and do nothing as possible.~w

My head is full of phlegm this morning. It makes thinking, let alone moving hard. It's a good thing i didn't have to drive to Indiana last night. In my thoughts this morning are Rodney and Carrie who did make the drive and will be performing as i write this without much sleep. Even more on my mind though is Carrie's tour partner Mike who lost his father yesterday and has gone home to help settle his affairs and prepare for the funeral.

This morning i stumbled onto the Oscar news with Michael Moore making world headlines for his acceptance speech. I suppose of all the stars he could be counted on to remember his right to freedom of speech. Perhaps some of the others still live under the cloud of the McCarthy hearings that terrorised Hollywood and caused them to bite their tongues so many years ago. Somehow that reminds me of Terry Pratchett's Interesting Times, a novel i finally finished Saturday. It's named after that old Chinese curse "may you live in interesting times."

I want to wrap a blanket of comfort around all those grieving and sad for one reason or another. I want to bear hug all my friends and family and whisper to them "we will get through this together." Mostly though, today i feel like i need to hold myself together because i've been trying to act like super woman for too many days now and even 10 hours of sleep last night couldn't fight off the impending cold and recharge my batteries.~w

I think my brain has blown a fuse. I'm going to go to sword practice and see if that helps.~w