Tonight I am thinking of...

• My friend, Ellen, whom I thought of on her birthday but neglected to call or e-mail. Um, happy belated birthday on my blog, if you are reading. (How lame is that?) I thought of her tonight because I was eating cookie dough ice cream straight from the carton. Back in college, Ellen taught me it worked better if you ate it with a fork, so you could rake out and enjoy all the cookie dough, maximizing your eating pleasure.

• How much I wanted to massage the knots out of my husband's neck and shoulders tonight. He fell asleep putting the kids to bed and is out for the night, meaning we didn't get our post-kids-in-bed time together. There is a bottle of lavender massage oil on my bedside table, taunting me.
• My nice clean bathroom. It helps to have a visitor in town who will play with the kids while I get work done around the house.
• The condolence card and (separately) the home video DVD we thoughtfully received from a friend and how much I appreciate that friendship.
• How I need to come up with some new tags and topics to make my ads more interesting.
• How much I want to find time and privacy to sit down and write a real blog post!

I'm trying to avoid thinking about...

• The thousand and one things on my to do list: thank you notes, returning a phone call from a friend, putting away the laundry, getting an oil change for my car, etc.

• The complaints I have been getting from my son's school about his behavior. I'm frustrated with the school and a bit at a loss as to how to handle both the school and what to do with my son.
• My husband's addiction. My mind is not quite where it ought to be. I've slipped into seeing things from inside the Matrix occasionally, instead of staying outside where I have been for the past few years. I feel like I'm looking at my finger in a glass of water and thinking it looks broken. I can see the warp, I know where it's coming from, but I can't make my mind see the finger as whole yet.