THURSDAY, 1/30: Notes: 2:22AM take sleeping pill. Wake at 7:20 and pee at 7:35. BATH to 8:20, FIND clothes to put on clean, and at 8:35 "padela wacon" doesn't START! (?) Bring two flower trays from 167: phoning John who says he's leaving, so I dash over for him to open the door, but later find I have front-door key in my Peruvian box! Take shower head, but it BREAKS off. Take shoe-rack and yellow rack and two plant cuttings and lots of almost-finished rolls of tape. Anyway, that's what was on the note that I transcribe at 6:43PM on 2/3! So sore that I take a BATH, and find that the water-temperature MUST go through cold before putting it on or off, which makes it difficult for the way I take a shower. Also, the VOLUME seems to be constant, though I remind myself that I didn't try to pull the faucet in or out, which may work. Wash my hair, then go through a number of boxes marked clothes before I can find socks, underwear, and a tee-shirt to put on clean. Then try setting up the TV-GO combination, and go OK til it asks to turn the TV to channel 3, and I look and look, but can't find my two TV REMOTES! Look through many boxes, but can't find them, other than the NEC and SONY, which are now obsolete. Open the window a bit, which feels better. Phone Time-Warner and go through a LONG menu until someone assures me he'll come with a universal remote. This is AFTER they phoned for confirmation about 8:30 and I said it had to be before 1, and she said that if he didn't show up BY 1PM, I could call THEN and cancel, which is convenient. Then about 10:20AM I'm getting hungry and put oatmeal in bowl and put it into microwave (which I'd set up to show the right TIME yesterday) and it doesn't START! Try many settings, but the microwave operation just doesn't come on! Settle for eating water-soaked COLD oatmeal, OK enough, and drink cold apple juice with pills until 10:45, after typing this. Look in other boxes until Time-Warner guy opens my door and walks in! He makes me a long and short cable, puts on the box, and explains nothing but that I go to Channel 100. Nothing seems to work until I get the TV tuned to Channel 3, then all the controls work from the remote. Find "Otello" with Domingo and Te Kanawa on NYCE25, and lots of junk. 51 is the Table of Contents, but it scrolls slowly, and Arnold says you have to get DTV to get good in-channel descriptions. Yeah. Mope more, feeling VERY tired, until 1:50, when I start dressing, but then I can't find my subway card! Search and search, (after taking one box down to the basement and coming back up to 20 to GET the card), but can't find it, empty another big box and get onto subway at 2:15, but even though the trains come right away, I'm still late and Charles berates me. My mushroom stew and his goat cheese and beets good, the duck and salmon are good, and the pineapple soup doesn't work, but the strawberry, lemon, and peach (?) sorbets are good, and he likes his chocolate-caramel banana tart. Stop in at Urban Archeology to look at OUTRAGEOUS tubs and torcheres and lamps and vitrines for prices up to $38,000! Back home at 5:10 to phone Allstate to be told Renee's on the phone, and wait a long time to get through to Gas and Electric, but they do close my old accounts. Then start, reluctantly, to put dishes on the bottom shelf above sink, then glasses above that, then storage, which is no good, move to side, and then cop out and type this to 6:44 and move to bedroom! Think to put the plastic mat under the desk and work-area, but I can't find the tape measure! Tried to open a can of green beans to have with my smelly-chicken dinner and can't find a can opener! Do a few things but just feel EXHAUSTED, so I sit in front of TV and look at the Channel 51 guide and tune into whatever looks watchable. Decide I've GOT to eat about 10:30PM, thank goodness the BROILER works and I can BROIL the chicken breast-patty without green beans and with only cream soda for beverage for my pills. Then put up the "temporary" blinds at the window and it DOES darken the room a bit. To bed at 11:55PM.
FRIDAY, 1/31: Take two little diphenhydramine to try to get to sleep, needing the razor blade to get through the impossible wrapper, which I do about 12:30 after some tossing, but I wake at 3:25 and have trouble getting back to sleep. Pee at 5:30 and up at 6:25 with the vitalizing idea of making a MOVING IN list of dates, positives, negatives, missings, and findings, with the number of boxes taken down in the elevator. Decide to just put things AWAY to clear off some of the floor areas! Start with the bathroom, finish that in pretty good shape, then try back in the kitchen, stuffing things into the shelves according to a map I make, so I won't lose things a SECOND time, and again start going in circles: got to get the cabinet ready for the porno which comes out of the bottom left kitchen cabinet before I can fill it up, but then put the mattress on the side, spray for mildew, put on the electric blanket cord, and go out of my mind trying to find the fourth flat-headed extension cord since the head of the bed goes vertically RIGHT AGAINST the plug---poor planning! Think there must be ANOTHER outlet along the wall, but move the double-chests and find none there, so pull bed out and put in flat cord which I FINALLY find in the living room at the dining alcove--unplugged since the travel bookcase CLEARS that plug near the window, and plug the lamp, the bed, and an extension cord into the one, then the clock, setting it finally, leaving space for the phone machine and the slide projector, which I'll probably use in the same "sitting on bed" mode. Moving a box at the entrance to the bathroom and THERE is my Metro card! About 10:15 decide I'm tired enough, so I call Charles to crow about finding the card, then call Mildred and bend her ear (too much, as it turns out), and when SHE talks about HER housing problems (and I'm SURE it must have been MORE of her than the "you talked for 23 minutes, and I only talked for seven, or maybe even only FIVE, minutes, and I made that NOISE??" I said that I LAUGHED when Spartacus did it to ME, and she said she couldn't POSSIBLY think I did it to be funny, or I must have been raised in a PIGSTY. She really IS getting to be impossible. Finally at 11 I decide to use HOT water for my unmicrowavable oatmeal, and type this to 11:18 (and called Charles to say we CAN'T go to a play tonight since my Atelier with Mildred is at 6PM!) and have breakfast at LAST! Do quite a bit of unpacking, watch quite a bit of television, go to a great dinner at Atelier, and come home to recall with great pleasure that I LEFT the j/o material in the top dresser drawer, and unwrap the lamp that accompanies it, put up the lower shade to make the bedroom COMPLETELY dark, but STILL don't sleep that well even after I jerk off from 11-11:30, and bed at 11:50, sleep quickly!
SATURDAY, 2/1: Wake at 2:10, 3:05, 5:20, and 6:20, pee at 6:30, and up at 8:30 and shit. Note when I got up, but didn't feel like doing ANYTHING, so I sat and read NEW YORKER for a long time, but then had to start with breakfast and then Spartacus calls and we agree to meet at the Great Wall for egg foo yung at 12:15, taking it to his place for orange juice and his chocolate pudding, then to Key to shop for the first time, bringing him back about 2:30 to see the apartment and there's JOAN in the hallway, so I show her the mess, she admires the rugs and the cabinets, and takes her silverware and letters and goes just before Spartacus does, leaving me two blank tapes, which I take to the TV to watch hours of the Columbia Shuttle disintegration, then at 7:40 decide I HAVE to go out for the Times, so I type this first and dress and go out for pizza, since I'm just too discouraged with life to cook! Bed at 12:35, having completed both puzzles and the pages of the Times, but leaving it all THERE on the floor.
SUNDAY, 2/2: Pee at 5:30 and again seem to waste most of the day (?), just sifting through television to watch "The House," and "The House II: The Second Story" (ha). Bed at 9PM, WEARY. Dream 1: Dennis and I are sleeping at 320 E. 70th and hear fire alarm. I go onto fire-escape and see lots of smoke and say "Though I see no fire, we'd better leave." Pee at 10:50PM. Dream 2 forgotten. Pee at 5:10 and then have Dream 3: Dad and I should be somewhere at 1:30PM, but he leaves and it's 1:40 and I know it's too late to get there at all. Pee at 6:46 and up at 7:16AM, having been in bed 10:16!
MONDAY, 2/3: Notes elsewhere.
TUESDAY, 2/4: Note elsewhere, and finally clear out the kitchen and empty the kitchen boxes from the hallway: DISASTER: the rock-salt sack broke so the bottom of the box and the things in the box are FILLED with salt crystals. Pack up five boxes and get ready to take them down now at 6:45 when I'm dressing to meet Arnold at the BMT token booth to see his Audience Extra find of "Adult Entertainment," and I'm glad to get OUT since I don't have the instructions to record anything, though I have an idea, and Time-Warner DID say they'd send directions. Also managed to get rid of lots of PAPERS and wrote a check and found a stamp for the 101 rent. Moving the radio around, conscious that I'm WAY behind in this, but hope to catch up SOMETIME. Oh, also unwrapped Bill's plunger after flushing FIVE times and failing to get a large turd down, and four times of PLUNGING finally does it. AND I took out a bag of junk and salt, AND a bag of cans and a refrigerator tray which I put in the metal-only can. And, I DID say this, take down four boxes of various sizes. Meet him promptly at 7PM, having mailed rent-check, and get to Variety Theater at 7:30 and then to get a Haagen-Daaz vanilla-almond ice-cream bar for $2.50 as dessert. "Adult Entertainment" is a real mishmosh: people starting incredibly stupid, then getting involved in "literature," which ruins them into thinking about life and death and the unity of all writings. And the filmed dances and songs weren't all that good. It's over 10:20 and we subway home. I open the two-drawer card-file to sift through some of the postcards from the left drawer and many of the restaurant cards from the right drawer, also going through checks, thinking that I'll now have the chance to get them ALL together, and maybe throw out the "ordinary" ones as I'd appeared to have done between 1957 and 1968. Finish that at 12:21AM, coincidentally, and look out at the clear skyline and put on my slippers and coat and stand on the balcony for a windy ten minutes or so, actually beginning to feel HAPPY about being here. Back in to put the program and ticket stub in the "to handle" pile in the bedroom, and finish this at 12:42, hoping to be tired enough to SLEEP for a change!
WEDNESDAY, 2/5: Notes before. Don't feel like doing ANYTHING, so I just take a New Yorker and READ until about 11;30, but then Arnold phones, or I phone Arnold to ask if "The Fabulist" is THIS Thursday or next, and it's THIS. Talk until 11:55 and then I start breakfast, talking to Arnold in the middle about nonsense, then decide I MUST go to 167 with the truck to see if the wastebasket and pots are still available, and enter to find the apartment ABSOLUTELY untouched, now a WEEK after I moved out. So I RIP all the plants out of the pots, piling dirt and stray leaves and branches in various plastic bags that I took over, and open the refrigerator to see a MASS of mold taking over the tepid water in the defrost tray AND OVER THE DOOR! Empty the water out and rinse the tray, but leave the door ajar as it is, taking the little light bulb from within. Take clay pot after pot and the two macramé hangings, and stuff them into the pink plastic trashcan with two uprooted shoots from the agave, and take them downstairs OF COURSE when the woman below John and her baby AND the colored lady and the judge's baby are ALL in the hall, and I say "This is the LAST load." Ask a woman passing to hold the door open for me, and she asks if I belong in the building? "You never know what may happen in Brooklyn," she laughs. When I get my armful out I joke "Wait till you read about this in the paper tomorrow!" She laughs and says, "Oh, no, you have an honest face." HA! Savor the LAST TWO trips up and down the stairs, then over to 101 and push the OUTSIDE wheelchair doorknob, but the INSIDE one needs the KEY to operate it! Now that I'm FINISHED, I know! Up and unload the pots, scrubbing them, then let them soak in apple-cider vinegar, which I think will do away with the crust for some reason. Then sit with the CHECKS for a long time, counting the ones I've KEPT and the numbers of the ones I WROTE each year, ending up with a magical 4040! Then about 4:30 feel hungry for lunch and into the kitchen to an appalling smell of vinegar and SCRUB the pots again, loading them up on the sink, and catching a ROACH, sadly indicative of many MORE? Finish about 5, exhausted, and make lunch, then finish counting the checks as it gets dark outside at 6, and can't think of what to do, so I start unpacking the black-compartment material, easy, then the stuff for the closet, having lots of room, then the clothes in the dresser, putting out two pictures from Mom: one of HER family and one of DAD's family, on top of the higher bookcases. Move slowly, emptying dirty-bottom boxes into the bathtub, stuffing things onto shelves in the closet and in the storage cabinets, and perversely can't find the end of the door-chin rod when I find the door-chin rod box! Look and look and it's GONE again! Put it on the list. Keep going, feeling vaguely ill from the smell from the open cabinets, and unpack about EIGHT boxes before I'm exhausted at 10:15, putting the moldering foam mattress from the body table under the bed on the far side and rescuing the calendar (which I was smart enough to furnish with the FEBRUARY page, also!) from the stack of envelopes I'd put on a shelf in the storage cabinet, and finish typing this at 10:30, still having managed to avoid putting the COMPUTER together, though I think I'm making room for it by getting rid of many of the bedroom boxes. Decide that the wastebasket makes an even BETTER table than the pulled-open kitchen drawer! REALLY tired now, so I've GOT to eat dinner and digest in time for BED! Watch "National Geographic" a good new channel, and try the "put TV-record on channel 3 and the TV on the station I want to record," and watch "Extreme Nature" and get a GARBLED recording, but at least it's progress? Next, try CABLE on 3---how? Bed at 1:07, right shin STILL sore but it's getting better?
THURSDAY, 2/6: Look at clock at 2:54. Pee at 6:30, lay and try to do Actualism but I guess I fall asleep and get up at 9:30. Have breakfast and put stuff back in white bookcase next to desk, cursing when bottom desk-drawer falls out AGAIN as I try to look for the successive deposits and withdrawals from my Schwab One account to jibe with the $83,000+ that I withdrew from it when I totaled the checks in that transaction register, but finally just leave it alone. Arnold calls and I make the mistake of telling him I feel slightly nauseous in the apartment, which leads him into THOUSANDS of suggestions of what I should do, and then insisting I tell him WHY I haven't pursued Carlos about fixing the radiator valves, and I'm finally driven to say, "I told you I don't feel well, so I just DON'T feel like having this conversation!" Have lunch and go to his place with the frozen turkey after taking a half-hour trying to get Donna for an appointment with Chin: he wasn't in yesterday at all and is in today ONLY from 2-3PM, so it'd be better if I called tomorrow just as I leave for his office. The first act of "The Fabulist" goes on until 5:05PM, so I obviously can't see the second act, so I take the V train to 23rd and 6th, and there's the Masonic Lodge which they let me up into at 5:30, and I listen to the sextet rehearsing, read the programs, look at the sumptuous double-height room with the three enormous Tiffany glass panels in the ceiling (used for the movie "Titanic"?), then hear the concert till 8:55, then out to have dinner at the poor Boston Market, meat loaf with cinnamon apples and creamed spinach, THOSE two not bad, but too full to eat the $1.49 huge piece of pecan pie. Home at 10PM to phone Vicki till 10:30, she complaining about how she and Sherryl have to separate for about a year so each can forget how each has hurt the other. Then watch "Raising Cain", campy Lithgow multiple personality by De Palma, then bed at 12:35 after brushing teeth with sore gums. See Chin tomorrow morning? At least my SHIN feels better and isn't as WARM as before, so I might NOT see Chin?
FRIDAY, 2/7: Forgot PILLS: take them at 12:53AM. Then wake at 2:11AM after a dream where I'm looking at porno from a TV reflected in a mirror above Dennis's bed, and he's playing with himself and with me, and I'm playing with myself and with him, and I say, "Who's having porno with whom?" and I take his big cock WAY down my throat, and wake with an erection that I decide to cum with, and get one of Bill's condoms and put it on inside out to enjoy the lubricant against my cockhead and cum quickly and finish at 2:45 and finish this at 2:50AM, bed again. Up at 8:45; 8:55 have breakfast and mark that I'm going to the gym, but at 9:25 I call Chin and say I'm coming in now. Snowing, about two inches already, but the lobby is full of people waiting for him. In at 10:19 and mention the palpitation, the nausea, the anxiety, the breathlessness and fatigue, and he says I should have a chest x-ray, since I haven't had one for a long time. I show him my right shin and he says I'd broken a blood vessel---just like Vicki! Down to empty radiology lobby at 10:25 and get the x-ray at 10:35. Back up and read ALL my New Yorker, furious that Chin's not taking me, and I ask Donna about it and she says something about "reminding," so that when Chin calls someone else, I ask WHERE is my X-RAY, and Donna says it just came up! Chin asks me why it took so long to come up, and I say I wish I knew, since I was the ONLY one in radiology! Anyway, he says he sees no sign of pneumonia, lungs are clear, and heart isn't enlarged, so it possibly COULD be something in my apartment, but the only suggestion he has is the EPA for costly air-testing. My blood pressure is 130/80, since I'm so FURIOUS about getting in so late, and he says I shouldn't go to the gym "for 7-10 days", but Vicki later says it lasts for WEEKS. FORGET to ask Chin about C-reactive protein test. He gives me an EKG appointment-slip, saying they might be able to take me right now, but I say I have an appointment and take the slip and get out at 12:06, angry that I have to go BACK to my place to get my Metro card and Met brochure with the list of exhibits I want to see---and walk down Montague to HENRY before realizing I'm NOT going back to 167! Up and try phoning the theater to make sure they're PERFORMING at 11AM, but it's only a lengthy recording, so I pick up stuff and leave, getting a Mars bar to slake my hunger on the subway, and get to the theater at 12:55, and I've only missed the first number of the second act of "The Fabulist," and the "two bodies as one" duet is great, and the final image of him being swept up by Apollo and taken to Olympus to amuse the gods is great. Out at 1:35 and get to the E/V platform before a train pulls in and says it goes to QUEENS, not the Lexington Avenue line, so I have to go BACK UP the escalator to the #6 line, get the local to 86th and decide to have lunch in Demarchelier from 2-3PM on mushroom soup and steak frites (large fatty steak, good frites) and no dessert, with a large glass of red wine, and get to long line for coats at Met Museum and pee and get to 1) "Blithe Spirit: The Windsor Set" in the Costume Institute downstairs from 3:16-3:43, then up the elevator to second floor for 2) "Cultivated Landscape: Collection of the Weills" from 3:44-4:19, some nice pine-tree scenes and then see the Japanese reading room and go to the window overlooking the Sackler Wing's Temple of Dendur, and ARRESTED by the incredibly beautiful Cinemascope vista of snow-covered branches of the Central Park trees framed in the foursquare sloping windows of the Sackler Wing exterior, with artistic blobs of bright red and blue from the snowsuits of kids sledding on the white snow in the lower left corner of the mesmerizing composition, heightened by runners on an upper road, and headlights from cars on various roads in view. Truly artistic sight and I wish I'd had my camera with me. Then into 3) "Written Image" for wonderful Japanese displays from 4:19-4:34, then to the Robert Lehman Wing, again by elevator from 2 to 1, for 4) "Janice Levin's Impressionist Pictures" from 4:43-4:56 upstairs and 5) "French 19th-Century drawings" downstairs from 4:57-5:33, beginning to be weary, but pass the Howard Gilman Gallery from 5:40-5:50 for 6) Struth's (I thought it was "struth" like lisped "struts" but then see it could be "S-TRUTH!") streets. Then to 7) "The Legacy of Genghis Khan" only through February 16th, and I don't want to have to go back NEXT week, and enter at 5:52 to go FORWARD to avoid screaming kid, and then go BACK to avoid ANOTHER screaming kid, and I'm getting VERY tired, almost---aha! (so maybe it's not my apartment, but only FATIGUE that causes this feeling?)---to the point of nausea, leaving at 6:53, not able to stand any more, and wait for my coat to 7:10, behind ANOTHER annoying kid! Out with relief to the cool outside, walk to subway, (ah, yes, got both subway AWAY from "The Fabulist" last night AND the subway to the Met this afternoon on a free transfer!) and to Clark Street at 7:45 and dash to Heights Video for "Minority Report" and "Y Tu Mama Tambien," and CAN'T play them on the cable! Talk to Arnold who makes me MAD when he says I should try a tape I recorded to see if IT doesn't work, when later he says he had said that I should try the old MACHINE, which I do, having disconnected the cable-box from the TV, and the old one WORKS. Don't care that much for "Y Tu Mama" with a too-smiley Julio, who has the sexier body and face, and that's over at 2AM and I've gotten ready for bed while watching the last few minutes.
SATURDAY, 2/8: up at 9AM and make breakfast and popcorn to have during "Minority Report," great throwaway science-fiction effects, ending at 12:55 and reconnect microwave clock at 1PM exactly and pick this up to type the detailed yesterday until 1:34, deciding to TRY to get the computer up and running before taking the tapes back at 7PM in time to get the Sunday Times, too. [End of AlphaSmart files 7 and a bit of 8.] Actually DO all the pieces, one by one, testing and working, particularly gratified when I finally find a way to put in the floor-pad that seems to work, though I can't find a good place for the PC tower itself, until by 5PM I've tested EVERYTHING (including an INCREDIBLY slow first catch-up on Juno for 28 messages) and it's all GOOD! Starved for dinner, so I cook that, by coincidence tuning to Channel 13 when they're doing the repeat of "The X-Planes," which is great. Then do FreeCell until 7:15, then MUST take the tapes back and get the Times, which at the "new" place between here and Heights Video has NO News of the Week section, and then to my regular place where the first two Timeses don't have it either, but then I find one that does. Back to start the puzzles, finding the doublecrostic particularly hard, but the "Nina"s of the crossword are fairly easy, so I'm back to the doublecrostic, making absurd guesses, most of which turn out to be correct, and using EB 1911 to find Stevenson's "Kidnapped." Finish about 10:30PM and have dinner while watching "Reign of Fire," with a particularly humpy and attractive Christian Bale, and get to bed at 1:20AM
SUNDAY, 2/9: Make note for today: 1) Put check in John's mailbox, 2) Get groceries, 3) Put AlphaSmart into PC, 4) Clean up for Spartacus. Before breakfast decide to sort out the IRS 2002 files, separating first into receipts, job-payments, utilities, and Express Mail two sets, then go through the rest of the sorts by about 11:30. Make oatmeal and try to put cable back to watch "Faithless," but it just DOESN'T WORK until in desperation I pull out the plug-above-the-power-plug, and when I put it back in IT WORKS! John calls back and I say I'll be there about 1:35PM, but with the TV delays and Spartacus calling and agreeing to come here at 3PM, I don't finish with the wonderful Swedish movie that I puzzle over the Erland Josephson character's name of "Bergman," (since I'd figured he was the older David that the ghost of his former lover had appeared to) was that the lawyer the wife finally hired? No, that was BERG. And only when Spartacus comes over and says that this was based on a story that Liv Ullmann told Ingmar Bergman that I realized that it was no coincidence it was set on the island of Faro, or something like that, and it WAS Ingmar Bergman that the actress was talking to! Write John's check and take the shopping list and get to his place and load up on groceries for $43 and change, lugging four heavy bags what seems a VERY long way to 101 (having gone a half-dozen steps WEST from Key before remembering to turn EAST to Henry, rather than WEST to Hicks!), and put stuff away and have a hasty (but delicious) roast chicken and wheat toast lunch until 3:10, having some time to clear things up from the floor before Spartacus arrives about 3:15. He's complimentary about my cleaning up the hallway and kitchen and bathroom for easy moving, but when he gets to the TV he can't do very much except influence me to try deck 2 of the NEW Go and find that IT works, so I have deck 1 on the OLD and deck 2 on the NEW! HA! He says I should phone them and complain. John told me about a cheap good microwave at the downstairs shop on Court, so I've got to start getting to THESE things. Spartacus asks me to dinner to look at HIS wirings, but when we get there he fusses with OTHER things about wiring that I'm not INTERESTED in, with his A/B switch, and never gets to the wiring at the back of his TV, the crucial part, and finally about 7:30 he serves us a lovely dinner of turkey breast with wild-rice stuffing, cranberry-orange sauce for the roast potatoes, butter from Dallas BBQ for the Chinese spinach (spinage in his saying), wonderfully light, and tomato juice. Bob's wonderful Bundt cake and orange seltzer for dessert, and finish about 8:15 saying "Either I leave now or I stink up your bathroom," and he lets me go with gratitude. Back and shit and sit down to FREECELL for a number of hours, cursing myself, getting to bed with a lousy 75% at 1:33AM, almost nauseous again from too much eye-work.
MONDAY, 2/10: Look at the clock at 2-something, 3-something, and 5-something, peeing at 5:55, back to doze on and off, thinking about all the moving I have yet to do: books and travel into the living room bookcases, finishing up the boxes in the bedroom, emptying the "linen closet" so I CAN put all the bedding there, finding my slide projector for the blue slides, and make a note to see Carolyn at 3PM. Up at 9:15 and put up the blinds, postponing once again cutting the over-long side and taping it to the short side, then put in the AlphaSmart files (pages 20-JUST to the end of page 25) (funny, moved my LEFT hand on to the right when I wanted to type JUST and it came out JUDY!) (AND with the editing moves the files end at the top of page 26!) and finish typing these additions to 9:57AM, deciding to proofread before having breakfast. Proofread till 10:33AM, feeling hungry, but happy to have caught up on THIS. Now I can put AlphaSmart away in the large storage cabinet! HEAT water for oatmeal for the first time, tastes MUCH better. Phone Terry to say I'll take index. Throw out now-old phone books and think I have to put card table under the bed (too BIG for ANY of the closets!) until it occurs to me I can put it BETWEEN the bed and the door, and it fits NICELY. Then at noon decide to print rest of MOVING LOG and the type is VANISHINGLY LIGHT! Fuss with the ribbon until I glance at the "head gap" indicator, which is ALL THE WAY FORWARD. Put it in the MIDDLE and start printing, and the "almost too-dim" ribbon becomes GOOD again! Solve one problem and cure a long-lasting BAD condition! Have JUST enough room to accumulate the pages behind the printer-table, which now contains the used-paper pile AND the dial-telephone! Sort through piles of stuff to be put away, and the "look-at" pile, which is enormous, and get over a dozen separate piles to put away, but it's 2:30 and I gobble lunch, having watched the beginning of a fluffy snowstorm through my high window, take down the monitor box, and get to Anderson at 3PM to be told I have to wait, and go in 3:18-3:57, no meeting next week. Start home, but decide I want to look at the microwave John mentioned at the Closeout Discount, and it's 800 watts and .8 cubic feet for $49.99. It's too heavy to carry, the manager won't let me borrow one of THEIR carts, so I walk home in the snow to get mine, getting lots of mail, but nothing from Time-Warner, and take the cart over to have the guy load it on my truck and make the bungee cords TIGHT by wrapping them around, and I'm learning more and more as I use it less and less. Total cost $54.11, on visa, and home to unpack it about 5PM, but then into the bedroom and don't feel like anything but FreeCell until 8:20, and then catch up with this to 8:25 and get back to sorting piles. Settle into a funk, bring stuff in from other rooms, then MUST have dinner about 11PM, watching a tape from Spartacus that I'd watched before, I'm sure, entitled "Sima's Pot." Overeat with steak, green beans, applesauce, strawberries and milk and honey, and a partly-rotten avocado, others going fast. Bed at 1:20AM after peeing.
TUESDAY, 2/11/03: Awake all hours, up at 8:55 after a GOOD Actualism session, then KEEP GETTING RID OF stuff on the desk, now deciding since I'd PRINTED all the previous pages in MOVING, I'll transcribe the notes I'm left with HERE: so 1) from 1/29: 10:40AM: they take BIG file FILLED with stuff, bumping down the stairs. He said, "It's not how heavy it is, it's how you move it." I LOST my PEN. AND my previous note! Last down (desk) at 11:56AM. I leave John in apartment. By 12:01 I'm on street walking to 101. Desk up first at 12:23PM. Call Carolyn. John verified that I have 522-0591 in my new apartment! 2) TUE, 2/4: bed 1:15AM. Fill out Saturday/Sunday MOVE lists in calendar. Pee at 4:17AM, no sleep; take diphenhydramine. 5:45 pee. Pee at 7:37AM, dizzy. Up at 9:30, SLIGHTLY woozy. Call Spartacus about future scheduling, both are NOT next Thursday, one is THIS Thursday. So that, blessedly, clears my desktop off COMPLETELY, now to clear off the coffee table of computer boxes so that I can start laying out the piles of things I have to take care of NEXT, now at 9:38AM.
WEDNESDAY, 2/12/03: 9:20AM: (continuing yesterday): but then I had to grab a quick breakfast (and find the new microwave, with its 1/3 more cubic feet (.6 to .8) and 1/3 more wattage (600 to 800) takes 1/3 LESS time (2 minutes to 1.5 minutes) to bring my oatmeal to fruition. Then late at 10:10 to the Zeckendorf entrance to her medical facility, but they didn't fax her test orders over, so we wait for that, then she starts drinking her stuff at 11:10, and again at 11:30, but somehow they don't need her to drink the rest of it, and they do the next two tests fairly quickly, so we're out at 2PM to take the convenient 14A bus across 14th to Avenue A, which leaves us off near Crif Dogs, the deep-fried hotdogs I'd read about and she'd found on 9th Street, and they're wonderful: I have the "Good Morning" wrapped in bacon, with cheese and an egg, and she has something chili-hot with Cole slaw, then she has a regular with their special free relish which puzzles her by including carrot, and we share a rather disgusting plate of cheese(awful tasteless, aftertasteful, melted American cheese)fries (griddle-patterned like Nathan's, and much better than the cheese, though somewhat over-greasy): that's one word, understand? She pays for it and her diet cola and my WONDERFUL $2.75 root beer float, and then I'm home about 4PM to get mail, GETTING at last an instruction-less A/B switch, WITH a Time-Warner bill for the first month's service which I thought I PAID. Look through the New Yorker with pleasure while I shit copiously from the deep-grease lunch, then phone Time-Warner about 5PM to hassle and find that I paid for the BOX and, mysteriously, $3.50 of my first month's bill; that the A/B switch will NOT enable me to watch one program while taping another, so he'll take that charge off my bill; and he helps me wire the sets properly for watching MY tapes, when I find that my OLD Go-remote will raise and lower the volume that the NEW Go-remote can't do; and when I say the BOX is frozen on "131," so I can tell it's ON, as he keeps asking, but that the POWER LIGHT never turns on, and so he says he'll check something and call me back in five minutes. I start watching Arnold's tapes, finishing the "Sima's Pot" tape followed by the "Homicide/Subway Fall" episode that I know I'd seen before, and leave at 7:50 without having been called to go to the "Dark Blue" that Arnold had reserved for BOTH of us at 8:30 at the Loew's on E-Walk 42nd Street, but that he's not seeing because "The Comedians," which he'd wanted to see, had become available further WEST on 42nd Street. No trouble getting in, continuing with the puzzle-book that served me so well waiting for Sherryl's tests this afternoon, and the movie's old-fashioned competent but not much more. Back at 11PM, not able to find, or sneak into, the 10:30 showing of "Lord of the Rings," and finding that it's LEFT the Loews Astor Plaza where I wanted to see it with the best screen and sound. Prepare a burger of the high-fat variety which really SMOKES as it finishes broiling, setting off the smoke alarm briefly, and I finish the "Homicide" tape and start on the (again) old Oz tape, but tire at 1:20AM and get to bed. Then, doing Actualism again this morning since I KNOW it works in clearing things up, come to a GREAT solution for my "Where do I put THIS?" quandary in putting things "away:" bring back the five-compartment metal file at the bottom of my white desk-next bookcase, with some old: 1) wait for mail, 2) see in city, and some new: 3) buy, 4) future LOCAL travel (like Mass Moca and Kaaterskill Falls), 5) Internet goodies to check NOW, rather than filing it and forgetting it on the huge stack, and 6) addresses, prices, information to free up "general do-stack," which has gotten totally unwieldy and hard-to-use and easy-to-forget-things-in, and I should probably add 7) HEALTH information to keep close at hand. Feel GOOD with what I'm doing and going to do, now at 9:41AM. So I do it and do it and do it, playing some FreeCell, talking long to Spartacus and Shelley, finding that my problem with the new Go remote was exhausted BATTERIES and I need about 6 new AA batteries, finding that 1.5 minutes works perfectly for my oatmeal, getting some Time-Warner refund because of my "box-outage" for a few days, then tackle the chests of drawers, filling them ALL and emptying ALL boxes from bedroom, so it's like it WILL be, for the most part, and it looks GOOD. Eat dinner late and get hooked into reseeing "Volcano" with good effects to 2AM, then bed and SLEEP!
THURSDAY, 2/13/03: Wake early, but doze some, and feel only SLIGHTLY out of it when I get out of bed after a third-day consecutive Actualism session at 10AM. AND my big turd didn't stop up the toilet this time! Nicely cool by the window, though I'll soon have to do something PERMANENT about my temporary black-out shades. Got a call from Piri this morning at 9AM, so my dial-phone is working nicely at my bedside permanently, but I have to get SOMETHING, also permanently, into the living room. Finish this at 10:15AM, hungry. BUT then decide to try a BIT of FreeCell, and in the middle of it MILDRED calls and apologizes for getting angry with me on the phone last night! I say, "It's not often I have to say I feel hurt," and she says, "Of course you felt hurt, I was angry with you without you having given me any reason to be angry!" I thought that was remarkable for her, and thanked her several times. I confessed to playing FreeCell, and when she said I hadn't been playing it before, I said only that I hadn't TOLD her I was playing it before. Gratified, I continued with FreeCell until I reached the magical 90% mark, then DID get off, noted it was 10:45AM, and then opened this to complete it to date (if I do it not only to the DATE, but to the MINUTE, do I complete it to minute?). Get boxes from the living room with stamps which I put into the bedroom chests, knowing that I have SOMETHING small to work on if I want to work microscopically. Lunch at 2:15 and then go to the gym at 3, going TWO levels below and STILL feeling somewhat sore afterwards. Stop at the locksmith to hire a locksmith for "about $60" tomorrow between 11-1. Spartacus said to meet at HIS place, but after I have dinner of the last of the fatty, burnt hamburger, I go toward the BMT before turning around to meet him. To City Center to find TDF did NOT deliver our tickets to the box office, and the managers WON'T let us in. He suggests we go to the box office and get cheap $25 seats, but I suggest trying outside, refusing one ticket for $76.50, then find a pair for the same price that the guy, conferring with an older gentleman, sells us for $50 for both, and Spartacus even compliments me on it! "House of Flowers" isn't that interesting, so we're home at 11 and I get to FreeCell till about 12, then do the cycle of Taipei and get to bed about 2AM, tired and sore from gym, toilet clogged up and the plunger turns inside out but STILL doesn't unplug it!
FRIDAY, 2/14/03: Up to pee about 5, toilet finally unclogging, and do a brief Actualism until 9:30 and up to start putting up brown bookcase shelves and getting to the Travel boxes, having breakfast, unpacking about eight boxes by 1:10 when the supervisor calls and says "He's on his way," but I start lunch of curried tuna on toast by 2:15 when he shows up and charges $119.02! Give Bob Lambiase the spare key at 2:45 and chat until 3:30 when he shows me his VCR programming on DTV, but I don't WANT to pay $40+ a month! Back to a bit of FreeCell, winning ten consecutive games and getting off to do this by 4:35PM, unpacking more boxes before dressing to get to the Beard by 7PM. Unpack about seventeen boxes of travel, filling two bookcases, down to two levels of boxes. Beard has good wine and what Ken calls "the best course he ever had at the Beard," and two screaming Estelles at one table is too much, though Fred and Lucretia are interesting. Home 11:15 and play FreeCell until 1:35AM. Bed tired.
SATURDAY, 2/15/03: Up about 8:30 to pay bills, get call from Spartacus about a Chinatown tour for $10 that Kit can't go on, and out at 12 after unpacking more, but only slide-screen box ready to be taken down. Good tour guide, cold weather, lunch of bean-sprouty egg foo yung at 69 Bayard and home after buying binoculars, new telephone for $8 for Spartacus's whim, and 20 AA batteries for $8 after trading in the eight that I bought for $8.64 next door. Spart comes up for his stuff and says he'll BRING me the Sunday Times when he comes to Bob's at 7PM! Put batteries in things and test binoculars and he's up about 7:15, so I do both puzzles quickly and sort through rest by 10:30, watching "Octopus" and "Octopus II" on Sci-Fi, and other junk on other channels, having cream cheese at midnight, a Viagra at 12:10AM, and cum from 1:15-1:45, OK, first with video in new apartment, and watch other junk until 3:48AM, when I FINALLY get into bed!
SUNDAY, 2/16/03: Pee at 5:30 and 8:30, then up at 9:30 and do this by 10:08, ready, unfortunately, for some FreeCell. Stop at 1:15 to get out to Piri's for the Games Group, getting there at 2:30 and staying until 5:30, good group of six with Judy Gex returning, but unfortunately including Barbara and Rose. A few snowflakes hit me as I go toward the Lexington Avenue subway, and by the time I get out to shop at Key, there's already an inch of snow blowing around Brooklyn Heights. Four bags of groceries somewhat lighter than before, and get home at 7:10PM to watch "The Music Man" with the barely competent (and too nice!) Matthew Broderick and the too old Christine Chenowith. That's over at 10, and I catch my first repeat of "The Shield," bloody and dirty-mouthed, then watch start of "Globetrekker" until I decide I've already seen Morocco, then surf until 12 when Channel 13 repeats "The Perilous Fight" of WWII films in COLOR, until 2:15AM, when I get to bed and look out at BLIZZARD outside BLOWING loudly!
MONDAY, 2/17/03: Pee at 5:30 and 8:30, then decide to sort through porno atop my stack, finding the electric blanket controls need to be reversed, and jerk off nicely until about 10:45AM. Just finishing a shit when Spartacus calls, we chat about snow and "Music Man," then I have breakfast at 11:45, phone Mildred and Sherryl and Vicki, finish the SECOND pint of Ben and Jerry's ice cream that I bought just 18 hours ago, getting 220% of my saturated fat for the two days, and decide to type this at 2:05PM. Then to FreeCell! Do that, then watch awful Michael Jackson specials, then AGAIN fuss to 1:30AM. STUPIDSTUPIDSTUPID!
TUESDAY, 2/18/03: Woke and jerked off again, then up at 11 to have breakfast, thinking to do a LOT today, but call for "Lord of the Rings" schedule and do THAT at 12-3:15, not able to sneak in "Daredevil" as I'd fantasied. Have lunch, talk to Spartacus, then do FreeCell to 90%, the cycle of Taipei to 7PM, and feel awfuler than before. Now to TV. DID check that the "disabled space" was for CARS only! Watch three hours of tacky Michael Jackson documentaries, smoking up the apartment even though the thick pork chop wasn't cooked through the first time, but succeeded when I replaced the aluminum tray and the fat no longer burned, not recording, and get to bed at 2:30AM!
WEDNESDAY, 2/19/03: Wake and breakfast at 10:55AM before calling Spartacus who's kind enough to say we can meet at 1:55PM at Mitzi Newhouse entrance, so I have time to get to gym at 11:45 and get home at 1:05 to wolf down a salami sandwich, delicious, before dashing out with bag of garbage and delay Xeroxing papers for STAR application, but subways are fast (though streets are sloppy from snow) and I get to him at 1:48PM and "Observe the Sons of Ulster Marching Towards the Somme" is pretty unexciting, but it WAS written 18 years ago. Then spend about an hour at the Nijinsky exhibit at the Lincoln Center Library, subway home to find there's no LONGER a Xerox at the subway station, broil the second pork chop and have to take DOWN the smoke alarm, fixing it so I can EASILY lower it to the floor when I'm making smoke, and watch Sci-Fi "Fact or Fiction" junk, then two more hours of "The Perilous Fight," of color film of WWII, then just catch the end of "Tunguska" on History, watch the divers on Bikini and H-bomb island to 12, then "Forensics in the White House" to 1, putting lots of stuff away during the interminable intermissions, and watch the beginning of Tunguska to 2AM, bed AGAIN terribly late.
THURSDAY, 2/20/03: Pee at 7AM and up at 8, not able to sleep more, finding that lowering the VENETIAN blind over the paper-blinds keeps some light out, but I've got to do SOMETHING about that soon. Sort through stuff on desk, making EKG appointment for 11AM, and catch up with notes and this to 10AM. Quick breakfast and to 200 Montague at 11AM to wait until 11:25 and get EKG until 11:40AM, results available to Chin this evening. To Arnold's to Xerox stuff, then see stone-naked couples and A-bomb photos to complete 2/22 deadlines, home to do taxes as far as I can, watch TV and record tape while seeing good "Tartuffe."
FRIDAY, 2/21/03: Up at 9AM to shit and clog toilet AGAIN, type this to 10:22AM, then indulge in FreeCell until 11AM, when I turn on the television to see what all the fire engines are going on about, and find there's been an oil-tanker explosion in Staten Island, wind thankfully blowing the smoke out to sea. Breakfast watching that, call Spartacus, then productively unpack TWELVE boxes of books, going nicely onto shelves which AREN'T missing, as I'd feared. Finish that by 2:55PM, have lunch, finishing the egg salad and somewhat stale roll, and then type this to 3:25, preparing AGAIN for FreeCell! Play lots and lots, then get out at 6PM to get to Duke Theater at 6:30 and get a ticket for "Antigone: Pieces of the Throne" which is quite startlingly outspoken against Bush, the war, and violence to repay violence. I'm impressed as I leave at 9:50PM, debating going home and savoring the experience (as I so seldom do), but then find that the Gaiety is starting at 9:15, so I'm in for 10 guys for $17, and I'd missed only two, and home at 12:30 to eat something and watch TV a bit and get to bed at 1:30AM, hoping I don't reflux, and I don't, but light STILL wakes me!
SATURDAY, 2/22/03: Up at 9:30, fussing and breakfast to 10:30, when I phone Charles, and he suggests a Dugdale photographic exhibit and the Greenwich Village Antiquarian Book Fair, so I play FreeCell and get out to meet him at 1:45PM in driving rain, have lunch at Le Gamin between the two, then I'm up to a lively M.A.N. at Pegasus, the thick-calved Robert speaking to me about our talk at the Brooklyn hot tub, and others nod agreeably to me as I munch two pepperoni pizza slices and a bit of salad and LOTS of good brownies, with two beers and much Sprite, then out at 9PM to get home to Times at 9:30 and read pages and do both puzzles by 1AM, tired, and bed without having done ANY unpacking today!
SUNDAY, 2/23/03: HAD going to the gym on my mind, but I DIDN'T go: started in on unpacking boxes after breakfast at 10AM, putting on WQXR and putting up shelves and unpacking THIRTEEN boxes, leaving exactly thirteen left in the pile, and at 4:30 I'm exhausted, so I get to a LONG FreeCell, finally looking at the scenery when the thick fog finally disperses, and get to 85% at last at 7:30, then type this and feel the cold pouring in the window: I think I'm getting a cold, TOO! Watch TV and fix dinner and eat in front of TV, realizing I hadn't gone to the gym today! Cold feels energy-draining, so I take NyQuil and two doses of 5 grams of Vitamin C and get to bed at 11:30, getting to sleep quite quickly!
MONDAY, 2/24/03: Out of bed at 9, feeling somewhat better, but decide I'd better DO things before the cold catches up with me, so I water plants and have breakfast and get out to the gym at 11AM, still below maximum weights, but I get through it! Back to play FreeCell and check Juno, then have lunch at 2:15 and get out to Carolyn at 2:45, mailing two address-change cards. See her 3:06-3:36, not much to say, and out to get 4 Glucosamines at Duane-Reade, for $8 and change rather than the $11 marked, then to Rite-Aid to find the same Fish Oils for $10, only finding two bottles but wanting more, and get the prescription. Then to Key for tons of groceries and lug them home and put them away and at 5PM get in to play FreeCell that I'd started earlier, finally getting up to 85%, and catch up with this at 5:35, STILL not feeling like doing anything useful, so back to FreeCell! Then to Taipei and then to MINESWEEPER for a long time, until I stop for dinner while watching mostly-wasted TV, again getting to bed late at 1:30AM.
TUESDAY, 2/25/03: Have the idea to get to the records today, so after breakfast and checking with Chin that my EKG was normal, and taking my name off the Fleet mailing list rather than changing my address with them, I GOT to the records and found EXTRA bookcase-shelf-bracers with the record shelves. More space available there than I remember, then I get to the components and hassle with extension cords for a LONG time, finally getting a wire hanger bent to retrieve a knot in two cords to replace the "old style" equal-prong inlet with the "new style" one-wide-prong inlet. So relieved to DO it I call Spartacus, and we talk to 2PM now.
Each box that I look at seems possible to get rid of, though I'm making more and more stacks of books, mainly, that don't fit exactly where the rest of the stuff in the box would fit. Do it and do it and do it until I'm actually down to ONE box (with EB 1911) in the middle of the floor, which other boxes stashed out of sight, like the "France" box on the bottom with other French stuff, and the Dual box atop a bookcase, just to get it out of the way. Begin to think I've GOT to clear out the paintings from the last of the storage cabinets so that I can put away some of the big books that need shelving, but it's 5:10 and I wash (and DON'T change clothes, these becoming REALLY ratty!) and leave for Village Playwrights, who seem to accept 1) Frank's perfectly AWFUL non-play that Manual says I do a good job reading the 60-year-old uncle for, and 2) my ideas for expanding the membership and activities of VP. Home at 8:30 and settle into more TV, just flipping through channels to see what's grabbing my attention. Again to bed at 1:30AM, but the cold doesn't seem to have ended or progressed, sleep QUICK!
WEDNESDAY, 2/26/03: Up at 9:30, breakfast, and decide I can put up ALL FOUR folding bookcases on the right wall next to the three shallow storage cabinets, and put the rest of the books on THOSE. But first I have to move the HEAVY old air conditioner into the closet, which I measure up down and sideways to make sure it'll FIT IN when I lug it, inch by inch, to the closet, and the paperback bookshelves fit neatly in WITH it, and the coats hang nicely ABOVE it. Vacuum the spot left vacant before moving the bookcases in, which means I have to take all the junk out that's blocking the vacuum cleaner, and phone Bill to see what HE does with cans (rinses and puts them in container IN a bag) and glass (HE just throws them down, but I put them out in a bag), and get rid of those. Harriet calls to say that Pope's moving to 412N when he gets out of Methodist Hospital, and when I call Dr. Bashi, who sound Indian, he says Pope's heel ulcer won't heal, he has poor blood supply so it might get gangrenous, become septic and result in septic shock and death, so they want to take the OTHER leg off early next week. Poor Pope! Tell Arnold, who says we'll meet at Dallas BBQ at 5:30 before "Little Fish" tonight at 7. When the bookcases are up it dawns on me with a BLAZE of invention that I can fold up the top shelf on one and display the nested paintings (other than my huge portrait, which I hang above my computer, where it already seems "at home") on the SHELVES, emptying one more (I thought impossible-to-empty-for-ages before) box, using a few of the shims I'd stored away under the bathroom sink so they won't sway forward, and repair Dennis's father's frame for Dennis's brothers "2 Vignettes" for Dennis, with scotch tape I searched for the OTHER ones of and can't find, though I found the LAST thing I'd missed on my ORIGINAL unpacking list: a spare videotape yesterday, but checking the lists found to my chagrin that I TAPED OVER a half hour of the Venezuela trip with the 26 minutes of my MOVE, but I have ALL of Angel Falls and lots of the END of the trip, too, so I can stand it. Then decide I've GOT to have lunch at 2:15, so I do, and then catch up with this to 3:43, not much time left in the day! Empty out the last-to-be-shelved cabinet COMPLETELY, putting the stamps on top of the sofa and move out the shelves, and then do some other things before leaving at 4:55 to take down two boxes and get to Dallas 5 minutes late, mediocre ribs, poor "Little Fish," and afterwards I invite Spartacus up to see my progress, and he likes the books "lined up" like the EB and the Masterplots, but says he'd almost like my cabinets OPEN so the colorful spines of the books can be seen. Helpfully suggests that the Dual would look better OUT of the box! He says I should use two bookcases above each radiator, but I don't think that's necessary. He tells me HE has to change the TV volume with the TV remote, AND two different Go remotes operate in two different ways (punching in "05" for five minutes, or "counting down" from "30" to "05." Then to his place and he fusses and fusses before giving me about ten hours of "Oz" and I'm home exhausted at 11:30 and get right to bed without Nyquil. Cold still seems pretty bad and Mildred calls to say she might cancel us for Manhattan Ocean Club tomorrow because SHE has the flu. Maybe it's all antrax?
THURSDAY, 2/27/03: Up at 9:30, ready for a full day, and measure the chair-heights for the final shelves and find that the last cabinet will take only TWO of the remaining six shelves, so each shelf is THREE DEEP! But the chairs, then the box of boxes, and the boxes, and the stamps, all fit nicely into the cabinet and THAT'S DONE, getting rid of the last box (which contained only boxes) from the hi-fi area. Breakfast while reading New Yorker, already finished with New York on the subway last night, then decide to open up Pope's file-box. What a CHORE! Look through his coins, try to make sense of his documents (and realize with dismay that he may have gotten the FORM from Cornell, but did he write the LETTER that had to be written to donate his body?), decide to keep his Spanish stuff in my travel section, and appropriate his Spell Master, putting in my last four good AAA batteries, though I have about 30 AA batteries spare! Really hassle over some of his things, rinsing off and keeping his Tea Tree oil and his two bottles of moisturizers and his garlic powder, but throw out the pepper and various eye drops, finally deciding to put all his REMAINING stuff (porno first, which gave me the idea of putting it all into Rolf's filing cabinet): the coins, the stereo camera and viewer and flash, his photo albums and trip journals, and then call EVERYONE to convey my sadness, but can get only Mildred, who says I should SEE him after he's operated on so that he'll be concerned about recovery and won't send me shopping for him. She cancels tonight. Take the Dual and the Panasonic out of their boxes, and they all nest nicely in the big "box box" which nicely contained Pope's file, which I reluctantly decided I didn't REALLY need to keep, and then clear out the LAST BOX from the center of the floor by putting EB 1911 on ONE shelf, easily cleared for the purpose by moving stuff within that cabinet, partway back so that volumes can be taken out easily through the blocked last door, and empty the box into the bathtub and unfold it to put behind my clothes in the closet, and then decide to empty ALL FIVE of the last Perryman boxes. So I go BACK to the Perryman box filled with boxes that I'd just put into the last-filled cabinet and empty THAT. EASY! Then empty the MASK box, putting them against the wall BEHIND the stuff already on top of the far cabinets, and they look OK there, and THAT box fits neatly into the one-last-box-to-take-down, which now contains FIVE boxes. Then tackle the Perryman box with the small paintings, and they all fit nicely on the shelves already occupied by the bigger paintings, then the last SHOWING Perryman box of "show souvenirs" and sort through, putting "good" stuff on display atop the NEAR cabinets, beside the air purifier and Dennis's chandelier and the three Lego canisters and the Wedgewood bowl and Rita's photo, putting 1) rocks, 2) shells, 3) wood, 4) "jewel rocks" into BAGS which I just toss atop the cabinets, and it looks OK! Then decide to empty the FRANCE box, the LAST of the Perryman boxes, and that stuff fits in nicely, and I tape the five last Perryman boxes together and measure to find it JUST FITS behind the clothes in the far closet, and then tape up the tie-rack, which holds nicely, and I'd put the Indian above-door piece above the chests in the bedroom, just to put it SOMEWHERE. AVOID the Key bag on the last shelf with tchotchkes from my old bookcase shelves. Take out a bag of trash, including some of Pope's jars and his fir-tree, and then take down the last five-box to check the index which isn't there, and no more mail, either. Get to my desk to start working on checks, still missing 1999 and 2000 somehow, but need more light, and my first attempt shorts out the red desk lamp, and I laboriously rewire it, taking maybe a half hour, cursing all the time, but it finally works and I sort out three TERRIBLY tangled extension cords from the "electrical" drawer and move the clock to the desk at 7:30PM. Then finish the IT-2105.1 with the S-number on the checks I got back from HSBC last night and look for the IT-2105-S---and can't find it. Look EVERYWHERE: wastebasket, old porno filed away, 2002 and 2001 IRS files THREE TIMES, Cadman towers shelf, checks file, BUT JUST CAN'T FIND IT! Resignedly fill out the form at 8:35, TOTALLY disgusted with not being able to find it!!! Then decide to catch up with this, now 9:07PM, having done a LONG DAY'S HARD WORK, but I'm essentially ALL unpacked with NO BOXES LEFT PACKED ANYWHERE! Great triumph and now back to desk!
FRIDAY, 2/28/03: Phone HIP who says I have to phone SSA for address change, and both calls talk ALMOST an hour of waiting, and I holler at BOTH poor women about it! Leave word for Walter Roundtree, but he doesn't phone back. Talk to Arnold and Vicki, and then out to the Microdose introduction (see Notebook - 3) that goes from 2:30-4, and then come back on the BMT (after finding myself at Lexington Avenue in time to get out to the RIGHT subway) to get two packs of four glue-on hooks at Bruno's and NINE tee-shirts for #30 at Barney's, figuring it's worth the CONVENIENCE even though they might be marginally cheaper somewhere on Fulton Street. Then to Key Food for three bags of stuff not as heavy as before, and AT LAST the index pages from St. Martin's Press have arrived, but I plump things down on the floor and clear out the Ponche Crema to put the seltzer bottles on the shelf and get out the 69¢ strawberries----and put the Ponche Crema on them, and they're FABULOUS, but they make me so happy that I sit down about 6:30PM at FreeCell and don't get off until 1:20AM, when I make soup and cream cheese for a VERY late dinner and watch an hour of "Oz" and get to bed at 2:45AM!!! Quickly to sleep in the new flannel sheets and pillowcase that I FINALLY changed on my bed, after more than a month!
SATURDAY, 3/1/03: Up at 10:15AM, rested. Tried Juno three times yesterday, twice after resetting computer, and couldn't get mail. Tried again today and could get mail ONLY by going through Internet-connect FIRST! And found out that "Dial-Up Connection" doesn't work because it doesn't put in the PREFIX code yet. Get 17 messages and when the screen goes slower and slower and finally freezes and I ctl-alt-del to get out, I think I LOST them, but get back in and they're there: 1) can't get last week's travelzoo.com Ireland trip, 2) Robert LaRocca sent me a Polaris North e-mail, 3) sign up for "Sleeping with Straight Men" tonight and a preview of "Radiant Baby" (Keith Haring) tomorrow at the center through Audience Extras. Talk to Bill Peterson, Bob Lambaise, and difficult Spartacus, NONE of whom have to use the plunger on the toilet, and MAYBE there's an obstruction that can be removed so I HOPE I don't have to buy a new toilet MYSELF! But it DOES need the plunger about TWICE A WEEK, and not for too much toilet paper, either. Count the pages (and read some) of the St. Martin's book, but lots of questions for Monday. Breakfast at 10:45, and finish with this at 2:35PM, ready for the rest of the day! Start moving the sofas around, then take quite a while to find the SECOND velour cover, finally in a plastic bag in the "linen closet," but don't like them squared off, so I try them in a LINE in front of the mirrors and it seems awkward, but it lets me put the TV where the people in the next building can't see the screen at all, good for j/o. Then take off at 5:50PM for the very fast subways that give me a chance for two yummy Krispy Kreme donuts, perfectly temperatured from the recent making, and see the problematic "Sleeping with Straight Men," whose poster and start promises a "laff riot," but then the gay guy is SHOT and the stupid straight seems willing to undergo the death penalty rather than being thought of as gay himself, which the shooting ironically CONVINCES people of. Back to buy the Times, read through the paper till 11:30, trying to do the "scrabble-type" puzzle fill-in, then finally make dinner and do the crossword, but keep working on the first until 1:30, when I GOT to get to bed.
SUNDAY, 3/2/03: Wake thinking of all I want to do, and make a list 1) call Bill to reserve the April meeting for Village Playwrights' expansion plans, 2) taxes, now that I have the 8829, 3) speakers, the last major "move" to accomplish, and 4) Radiant Baby lecture at the Center tonight. But OTHER things prey on my mind, recorded now as I'm finally finished with FreeCell from 12-2PM!: 1) the "replace battery" light is on my APC bar, 2) I want to get to FUN things like sorting receipts or travel stuff, 3) call Fred about Cruise (no) and Ireland (yes?), but I get only the phone machine, 4) WILL I have to change toilets? 5) WILL the hooks hold after the odd glue dries in 48 hours? 6) WHAT will I throw out next, now that all the BOXES are gone. Finish this at 2:12 and reluctantly start day!
John calls, comes over to bring about nine inches of books back and TAKES an equal nine inches so I have space to place the incoming books. LOTS OF TIME will be needed to proofread all he's done ALREADY, though he's getting close to the LAST of the books to be typed!!! Spend about an hour sorting wires and cables in Rolf's file's drawer, then at lunch go back to trying to solve the puzzles, finally getting all three of them with the help of Pope's Spell Master, which gives me "seashore" which I'd not thought of! Then at 5PM watch an hour of "Oz" before leaving to sit outside the central hall at the Center, for which I did NOT need to reserve at Audience Extras, but should I bother them with that? "Radiant Baby" sounds decent enough, and the Haring look-alike is sexy enough, but it's only 55 minutes long and I walk over to Johnny Rocket's for a St. Louis burger, better than the double-burger because it leaves me enough room for the extra-cup hot fudge sundae. Back to have to leave the 2-train, which I walked ALL THE WAY BACK to Seventh Avenue for, rather than risking the BMT which might not go to Brooklyn Heights on the weekend nights, because of a fire at Grand Army Plaza, so I take the next-coming uptown train where I get the A immediately and get home about 10PM, enough to watch the last two hours on one "Oz" tape and then sit though the 160 minutes on the second tape to the end about 2:45AM, taking my pills as an afterthought and brushing my teeth and getting to bed MUCH too late.
MONDAY, 3/2/03: Wake early but lie comfortably until about 9:30, thinking about all the things I have to do now, including proofreading the books John brought over yesterday with his $1520 bill. Call Kevin Sweeney with index questions, and it looks like a snap. Breakfast finishing reading the Sophisticated Traveler section and for a long time can't find the pages I took out on the English gardens to read the last page of the Myanmar article, but later find it ON MY DESK, where, of course, I'd looked already. Call Arnold at 11AM about Paul Taylor, and he wants to see Twelfth Night, which he schedules on TDF with my Visa card for Wednesday, along with the only Paul Taylor I want to see conflicting with the Games Group next Sunday. Pity. Start FreeCell when he takes ages to connect with TDF while I'm on the phone, and keep going until about 1:30PM, when the APC starts BEEPING!!! I try to bull through the FreeCell game which might have taken me from 83% to 84%, but I get nervous with the constant beeping, since the "replace battery" light had been on for a few days, so I get out of FreeCell and shut down the computer, which leaves "Check Power Cable" message on the monitor, and shut off the APC. Try to ignore it, but I've GOT to get back to check it, and when I put the APC on again, there IS no "replace battery" light anymore. Did it just want a rest? Power up again, OK, and finish this at 1:45, ready for lunch before the Beard dinner tonight at 7PM. Sort out more tangled wires, then get disgusted and play FreeCell until I leave for the Beard, poor dinner from great AZ, Fred and Ken and a couple at our table seem to have interesting enough conversation to make up for the poor food. Back with Ken to copy down some of his wiring, get home to find a message from Shelley at 10:35 that I return at 10:45, and write a note to have brunch with her at Clark's corner at 11:45AM tomorrow, which I BURY AND FORGET. Watch some TV and get to bed at midnight, still coughing, but drunk enough to fall asleep quick.
TUESDAY, 3/4/03: Up at 9, having coughed a lot, have breakfast, untangle the last of the wires, labeling everything, and Shelley calls from restaurant at 11:55AM!! I leave a message apologizing to her. Look at horror of stringing wire from speakers to my bedroom, and decide to just take the boombox. Then do puzzles until lunch, playing "Aspects of Love" to work the cassettes, and the CDs work VERY sporadically: playing 30 out of 45!! Get the humidifier to work, which had totally dried out for some reason, and just DON'T FEEL LIKE DOING ANYTHING USEFUL, so I continue with crosswords until I'm bored, then do FreeCell until I FORCE myself off at 85%, KNOWING it'll become a disaster if I continue playing, and catch up with this at 7:30PM: hope to remember "Twelfth Night" tomorrow!
End up watching junk TV, including almost three hours of "One Hundred Best Moments on TV," while switching to other channels during ad-breaks. Bed 3:20AM!
WEDNESDAY, 3/5/03: Wasted day in which I make lots of phone calls, measure lengths of speaker wires but the damn Sony Amplifier won't play A and B at the same time! ABSOLUTELY frustrating, so I end up with FreeCell and Taipei before "Twelfth Night," and dinner at Thomas Beisl Restaurant from which I bring back enough for lunch for me AND Spartacus tomorrow, which I tell him on phone, and then watch "Johnny Mnemonic" from 1-3AM, which I thought I'd seen before, but it's not on my list and Friday I even searched through past "TV-watch" lists and couldn't find it, so maybe it WAS the first time I saw it! Bed at 3:15AM AGAIN!
THURSDAY, 3/6/03: Up at 9:30, feeling surprisingly rested though I slept very poorly, though thankfully not coughing, but the mucus-drain in the morning is truly stupendous, still sporadically taking 5 grams Vitamin C. Call Charles and agree we want to see "Far and Wide," but I get to Juno and I STILL can't get in through "e-mail," but CAN get in through "World Wide Web!" Search through many Travelzoo entries, taking down addresses and numbers for Spartacus and me to possibly travel to Ireland, and search Audience Extras for nothing. In preparation for Spartacus coming for lunch at 1PM I move the plants and a lamp to the window near the sofa, move the floor lamp from the bedroom near the far cabinets and burn out the circuit when I plug it in, and put the lampshades on the two table lamps at last, opening the table for storing all that I want to do, and now that I've finally to SOME extent (moving the Sharp boombox to the bedroom, playing in the living room with the big speaker) finished wiring, all I have LEFT to accomplish (beside the huge pile on the bedroom table) is finding WHAT the hell I can and can't do with Time-Warner before calling them for relief from my frustrations, and clearing out the stack of Sunday Times TV sections from before my move! He arrives at 1:20PM, enjoys lunch, can't help with the CD or amplifier glitch, and I finish e-mailing the movie-question index TWICE when he can't take the width of the first transmission, AND re-submit my final $2000 bill to HRW when Denise says there's no RECORD of my 1/27 submission! Lots of FreeCell which gets my average up to 83.84%, still short of my 83.86% high, and out at 5:15 to THINK to be early to the Mint for the "Far and Wide" waiting list with Charles, but meet him waiting for the elevator. Great play, which I was confident we'd get into, and even two AFTER us got in. Then dinner at Esca, tasty turbot, and long wait for subway and home at 1AM to get to bed 1:20AM.
FRIDAY, 3/7/03: Up about 9AM, still sore throat from morning mucus-drain, get rid of the stack of Beard brochures by updating the last four month's pricing lists, update my index-work hours to 36:30 for November, theoretically 156:30 behind as of the first of March, but that didn't include the FIRST set of HRW hours, so I'm hopelessly out of sync unless I just start HERE at random. Update the "lost" list with the Sony Amplifier and Sharp boombox instruction brochures, and call AGAIN for an AIG address change, this going through OK. Then catch up with this by 11:10AM, without breakfast before leaving at 11:30 for the noon lunch with Fred at the Beard, not yet going through my Choice February bill and filing even MORE Cadman Towers meetings and elections and information. BUSY BUSY! DO get to the end of the Choice bill by the time I leave for the winey lunch with Fred and his entourage at the Beard, signing up for the Monday $55 bargain but not telling Mildred, and get home about 3PM to get notice that my NYS tax-amount has been confirmed, and up to start playing FreeCell, stopping at 7PM with a local high of 83.84608%, but go on to ANOTHER cycle and at 7:45PM build it up to 83.85075%, THEN do a cycle of Taipei, and go BACK to FreeCell to get involved in a losing sequence until 1:20AM!!!, when I just shut off the screen and take all my pills and GET TO BED, feeling woozy and coldey and UGH!
SATURDAY, 3/8/03: Up about 7:50AM, feeling just barely OK after 6.5 hours in bed with two pees and still-snotty nose, and get BACK to FreeCell, FINALLY by 9AM getting it up, after NINETY-FOUR games in this, the THIRD cycle, the first two of which I managed to get up to 90%, calculating I've JUST gone above my average, so STOP at 83.85127% and NOT try ANOTHER which I'd probably lose and get into ANOTHER DAY WASTED with the cycle! DETERMINED to do better today! Start by checking back to see in this chronicle if I can find what I did with the 14 or so backup diskettes I THINK I made before I moved. Oh, and checked the SUN this morning about 7:50AM and it was ON the balcony, so I could WATCH SUNRISES if I really WANTED to, for over HALF A YEAR! Now to wait for my first SUNSET in view. Searching back with "disk," I find that on page 5, 12/17/02, I made the copies AND TOOK THEM TO SPARTACUS'S when I went to pick up my belongings-videotape! So I called him and he said he'd look for them. BUT, to make sure, I made SIX diskettes-copy of JV files AGAIN, unchanged since 12/17, and ONE copy of the changed files in MY, and felt good about THAT. Had breakfast about 11AM, then tackled the taxes, after clearing off my desk to a large extent, only to get hung up needing Publication 590, which I phoned to get, coming in ten days, and qvetched to Spartacus about THAT. Also checked Freighter Amazing Grace when Fred's recommendation of www.travl.com turned out to be fruitless, and printed three pages of information about the ship, and Fred said he'd be willing to do the South America circumnavigation in January or February! About 2:30 I was too hungry to shop, so I had lunch, then carried out two HEAVY bags of newspapers and magazines to the compactor room, got groceries and my laundry and the mail and an Express Mail package from a travel organization, threw lots of stuff out, and decided to finish checking which CDs played and which didn't, coming up with about SIX stacks (play, don't play, spin, played after not playing, play sometimes, one CD of two plays and the other doesn't), then look behind the TV to find the stack which DOES include the instruction brochures for the Sony (and found the 1999 and 2000 checks by looking through the bookcases, too!--what a PRODUCTIVE day!!) and the Sharp, and looking at the Sharp CD directions reminds me of Sherryl's recommendation to WASH the CDs, and I DO, AND THEY ALL WORK!! Phone Sherryl and Spartacus to crow about THAT, and also call Bob Bennett and Bob Quinn and Manuel about the Woman's Orientation on 3/17, and Manuel demands that I call Barbara Kahn, which I do, who he'll work WITH, but not WITHOUT. AND looked at the purchase price of the remaining Schwab One stocks to sell to pay for the $4745 March Visa bill---not to mention the tens of thousands I'll need come APRIL 15 when I finish my taxes and have to fill the Keogh, IRA, and taxes and ESTIMATEDS. Finish ALL this by 8:50PM, and feel SO good about it that I catch up with this by 9PM, ready to get the Times and have dinner over it. Even STARTED piling up the TV guides to throw out in preparation to finding how to TAPE successfully, the LAST major task of "moving in." Do that, and bed 1:35AM.
SUNDAY, 3/9/03: Start list of dates when toilet clogs, 3/8 not flushing down after 6-7 attempts, finally had to use plunger to clear, and then a mess to clean! Pee at 5:30AM, and look out window, seeing a faint light in the east before sunrise today at 6:18AM (and sunset at 5:56PM), and video SUN that I saw at 6:55AM from my WINDOW (not even having to go out on the balcony), looking forward to seeing if I can see the SUNSET position equally soon in the year. Then up at 7:30AM, just LESS than 6 hours, because I've become energized about fighting Marta on trying to get Helen's money, or letting it go to Jimmy's SON! Write a long e-mail to Rita and Jack Lynett and print it out and catch up with this at 9:13AM, going to a bit of FreeCell before breakfast. Then decide I have to vacuum before Vicki comes, and wash the mirrors, and clean the bathroom and kitchen floors, and wash dishes, and arrange things nicely. Then go to the gym, return to actually make PROGRESS with taping, thanks to Sherryl's instructions, and get down the first volume of John's typed stuff to proofread. Feel VERY good about all I've done today. Vicki comes about 5:45, we order from the store that replaces The Bedouin Tent, she moves some chairs around, we eat well at 6:55PM and play 3 games of Scrabble, she winning one, me two. She leaves; this by 11:30.
MONDAY, 3/10/03: Wake to jerk off, denying myself the opportunity to do so this evening on my return from the Beard's dinner. Visit to Pope on NOTEREPL-5, otherwise cleaned the bedroom mirror which I'd forgotten yesterday, took notes from Mildred (who said she'd be able to loan me about $20,000 between 4/15, tax time, and 6/04, when all my Federal Home Loan bonds will be called because the interest's too high, according to the Schwab bond guy, who said it'd take 3 days for funds to clear on the $5700 I got from selling all the Bank One Corps) on Helen's will's problems which I sent in an e-mail, STILL having to go through Web to get mail, but was happy that the two programs last night RECORDED, particularly since Spartacus DIDN'T get the SAG awards through his taping error. Picked up the SAG tape from Bob Lambiase on the way back from Carolyn. Sent an address-change postcard to St. Vincent-St. Mary, though I was tempted just to leave it lapse. Will be running out of cards soon, GOT to see about buying a copier! Egg salad lunch delicious, but I think a pound's a bit much. Overdosed on ice cream and almost (no, DID) doze off while doing the New York puzzle. New Yorker arrived on MONDAY for the first time in ages. Sunset sun, about 6PM, WAY to the south of the end of the building, so I won't see that for a LONG time---so even THIS building isn't oriented straight east-west. Finish now at 6:20PM, not yet starting proofreading the next volume of John's typing. Dress in my navy blazer and black pants and dress shoes for the Beard, again meeting Fred as we exit the subway car, and find the place almost empty, but the appetizers are good, though I don't care for the lettuce soup, and it's the same cast of Madeleine and "Helen of Madison," which I thought was Madison Avenue and it turns out to be Madison, New Jersey, and Evelyn, who sits between me and a caustic Dorothy, but only the sweetbreads are dynamite until we get the delicious chocolate tart for dessert. Wines aren't very good, so I don't drink much, thankfully. Home at 10:45 to watch "The Pentagon Papers" and get to bed about 12:40, still leaving desk with piles of stuff to handle tomorrow.
TUESDAY, 3/11/03: Watch actual sunrise at 6:15AM, bright half-cherry on the easily-seen horizon, though the sunset isn't NEARLY visible. Up at 8:30 to watch the SAG acting awards until 10:30, when I have breakfast while skimming through the Academy Award nominations on Spartacus's tape, then watching the BAFTA awards, hosted by the very funny Stephen Fry and climaxed by an incredible speech by Sol Zaentz on the "criminal people of power who corrupted the Supreme Court to steal the election, and now is a state ruled by the very few for the benefit of the very few." Type this at 2PM, ready for faxing my address change to the Directory of Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender Services, another thing on my table-stack of things to do. Decide to see what's on Audience Extras and sign up for "Barbra's Wedding" for tonight and "God and Mr. Smith" on Friday at the Mint Theater. Probably played computer games until the show, picking up a FedExed index from the desk, and bed after lots of junk TV about 1:30AM.
WEDNESDAY, 3/12/03: Decide to make the window-bookcase ONLY travel, so I get lots of books to put elsewhere, moving things around, labeling boxes, listening to CDs on my boombox moved into the living room, have breakfast and lunch between these, and file LOTS of things (personal souvenirs, ticket stubs, badges, dance and opera programs) and arrange LOTS of shelves, essentially leaving only the US and NYC souvenirs to re-arrange. Eat TONS of Edy's ice cream during the day, enjoying egg-salad sandwiches, and get down to the boring co-operators’ meeting from 8-9:35PM, then up to watch junk TV to about 1:30AM.
THURSDAY, 3/13/03: Start watching TV, get a call from doctors about Pope, so I decide I've got to call Doug, who'll be driving up Saturday morning to see Pope with me, and Spartacus would like to come along too, and call Carolyn about it, and then Doug, and leave messages with Paula, Dr. Bashey, and Cornell, and then Spartacus, and then e-mail Sandy, all to see where his organ-donor card may be. Harriett says I'll probably have to come to Cobble Hill to root through: 1:45PM.
Harriett never calls back. Watch three TV movies, so maybe the rest of day was spent tearing out to-keep pages from play programs. Not much going on.
FRIDAY, 3/14/03: Make a list of those I leave word with about Pope: 1) Cornell (who calls to say I can make an affidavit at the time of Pope's death!, 2) Paula, who says Pope is nonresponsive when she calls about 1:15PM, so I phone Doug and say he probably doesn't need to come. When I talk to him later, when Carolyn is here about 5:30PM, he ends by saying "I love you," and I, from reflex action?, say "I love you too," and then cringe about it a few times later that day. What did I MEAN? What did HE mean? 3) Bashey, who summarizes his condition as a) adult respiratory distress syndrome (ARDS) for which he's on machine with 90% oxygen, though usually they never go over 40%. b) sepsis infection and septic shock from yeast infection, taking multiple antibiotics, c) blood pressure down, dopamine for fluid volume, but urinary output is OK, d) he's in critical condition for few days now (in bed #9 of Respiratory Intensive Care Unit on third floor of East Pavilion), multiple failure, heart and lung. "If his heart stops, he goes to rest." I agree. Most of day on phone, bit of FreeCell, meals perfunctory. Carolyn over 5:15-6:15, then I'm to surprisingly good "God and Mr. Smith," with GREAT laughing Arabic secretary and idle-mad mailman, with a Ben and Jerry's hot fudge sundae with triple caramel ice cream, odd. To Spartacus to get FIVE tapes to watch before trading tapes at Marty's, Tyler, sexy, LOVING my name: "Bob Zolnerzak, it sounds like a superhero. How neat!" Love him. Turn back the two coincidental "sympathy for killers" tapes: "Road to Perdition" and "The Bourne Identity." Bed comparatively early at 1AM, sleep quick.
SATURDAY, 3/15/03: Wake coughing at 5AM, take cough suppressant, blown-nose bloody as I shit and clog toilet, overflowing which I let dry, while thinking "How could I have gotten anthrax in my system?" Up at 8:30 for breakfast and watching more tapes, Dr. Ragasa calling and I say NO to a blood transfusion: she says "VERY little hope of any improvement," will do another test and call me back before I leave for MAN at 5PM. Exchange tapes, Tyler savoring "Mr. Zolnerzak," and I do this by 12:32, ready for FreeCell and John's typing proofing. And the FreeCell goes to 2:35PM, when I have lunch, and then continues to 6:05PM, when I leave for the MAN meeting at Marvin's. Back and do puzzles and read most of Times but feel EXHAUSTED before going to bed at 12:15AM.
SUNDAY, 3/16/03: Type dreams to 8AM in bathrobe before still-drawn window shade, and actually figure to go to FreeCell to try to make up for yesterday's debacle when I played five hours and HAD to shut it off with only a 75% local average, after I'd taken weeks to get my total average of 83.86253, only .00055 off from very highest on 11/30/02, which was the score of 83.86308, but is now 83.84672, down .01581 in 65 games played in the 5 hours yesterday, an average of 13/hour, which would make roughly 2682 hours for the 34866 games played, or 335 8-hour days, a VERY full year with only 30 days off! AND remembered to note that I can negotiate my way around my opening screen with the DIRECTION-ARROWS, but can't figure how to "maximize the screen" without using the mouse, which of course I need for the PLAYING of FreeCell. Now 8:15AM. Worked, wasted time, and I guess this should STOP the MOVING journal, since I'm not doing much MOVING at this point: worrying about when Pope's going to die, playing entirely too much FreeCell, and now, on Wednesday, 3/19/03, at 4:33PM, I'm finishing this after printing out the bill to Watson-Guptill for $280.80 after printing it erroneously for $380.80. Will work on New York State taxes while waiting for yet another IRS publication, this one telling me how much I can put into my Keogh plan, and already my "debt" on April 15 exceeds $24,000! Thank goodness my bonds will be cashed in June so I can pay back Mildred for her loan, and now it's GOT to come through. And while waiting to join Charles at Union Square Cafe for dinner before seeing "Our Lady of 121st Street" which Charles bought half-price tickets for at tkts when I'd already seen his other choice "Adult Entertainment"
TUESDAY, 3/25/03: They take down the plastic from my balcony at 3:50PM today, and when I look at the window, I see that they've actually CLEANED the outside of it! A real milestone. On Friday I phoned the "last three" items to Maintenance: 1) radiator valves, 2) venetian blind louvers, 3) toilet stuffed, and on Monday, 9AM, Augustus, Gus, appeared with a cart of supplies, replacing a piece, and saying that EVERYONE had this problem, and the next time it happened I was to phone the DESK downstairs and have someone come up to see it THEN. UGH! Pope's dying at 1AM on Saturday, 3/22, make days since then more occupied with HIM than with the apartment, though when I went to the Philately window to buy my stamp book, I found it was CLOSED because "the woman hadn't come in today," and when I tried to dial the post office, I merely got a permanent busy signal.
THURSDAY, 3/27/03: 9:20AM: They're still working outside on their roped platform, which prevented me from jerking off in the living room for the past few days in the fear that they might sail past without my hearing them. And now I guess I have to think about getting my windows washed, since they don't seem about to take the screens off to do the outside of the inside windows. So I'm still not COMPLETELY moved in.
FRIDAY, 3/28/03: 9AM: Looked out the window onto the balcony yesterday to see that they'd covered the floor of the balcony with some black substance, not very thick, and they'd taken off the drain protector, so I hope they had some vision of bringing the level of the floor up so that the drain WORKS, rather than letting the water collect in pools on the balcony. Then this morning I looked out to see they'd spread what looked like SAND over the whole area, including the lip under the railing AND the ledge into the living room AND the drain opening, but I hope it's temporary in some way---but at least they're WORKING on it and still using the roped platform to good effect.