I really want a pair of tennis shoes and this was my goal yesterday and despite four hours of wandering from store to store marching down Broadway from Union Square to SoHo, I could not find a pair that I wanted in my size. Basically, I want this one pair of brown leather Asics and only a few stores had them, and none of them had it in my size and I resisted the urge that often comes over me after hours of shopping to just get something, anything and end this ordeal, to feel like those hours were not wasted, but I was really proud of myself for saying no after trying on a pair of shoes that I wasn't totally in love with but which were comfortable, for saying no, that I don't have to buy something just to have bought something and I felt so good afterward listening to music walking in my same old shoes.

I did however end up buying a couple DVDs for five dollars at Circuit City and a couple used books at Housing Works, but those are purchases I felt were somehow acceptable, somehow good for me in the long run. I got home at maybe four thirty in the afternoon and was totally wiped, wondered if it was too early to order a pizza, wondered if it would be too gross to order one even though I had the house to myself, and said Fuck it, said Merry Christmas Charlie, and ordered a pizza, ran to the bodgea, picked up a six pack and watched movies and drank beer and stuffed my face with pizza and I was so glad there was not the chance of a roommate walking in to find me drunk by six with an open pizza box by my side. I was too aware of what a sad picture it would make, and so thankful that there was no one there for it to be a picture, that it was just mental speculation on my part, since I did not even have a mirror to observe my own self in the scene. Hours later, Adele came home as I was trying to shove the pizza box in the fridge and I ate more pizza, drank more beer and watched Last Days with her.

And I found myself again telling myself that this was good for me, the same thing I did during Elephant and Gerry, that it wasn't boring, that I was just too trained to view things in certain ways, and this was an act in trying to retrain my ways of perception, of learning to see the beauty in these slow shots, these boring scenes, and I told myself this until I fell asleep, falling in and out of consciousness, eventually waking up for the credits and the cars descending on the house.

I just picked up some shifts for some reason, because I am mildly bored and because surely, I could find a way to spend that extra money I will have, and I am working two graveyard shifts this week, one of them tomorrow after my evening shift. So tomorrow, I work fourteen hours straight, from 3pm to 5am, and believe it or not, I am really excited about this. Staying up through the night sober and being up for dawn is something that I haven't experienced in far too long.