Amazon is having a sale on DVDs. I found myself browsing through the long list of discounted titles while on the phone with Daniel. I found a birthday present for him and then came upon the Val Lewton Horror Collection which has long been moldering on my wish list. I was excited about it being within my price range and then Daniel and I had the following conversation (paraphrased for conciseness): “I’ll buy it.” “Are you sure? Because I’d be happy to buy it …” “But I’ve wanted it for a long time.” “But it would go well with my classic horror collection.” It was an exchange that would have only been made complete by us each having our hands on either side of the box, attempting to gently wrench it free of the other’s grasp. This went on for awhile, but ended abruptly when I found another long standing wish list item marked to half-price: the Tennessee Williams Film Collection is mine, all mine.

Mark Twain and I have something in common.

This morning I cashed in most of the coins in my Maneki Neko. I say most because not every coin in the bank was intended to be spent, most notably a half dollar my brother gave me in change when I visited him at a restaurant where he was working. That half dollar, appropriately enough, is actually too large to be extracted from the intact cat. The total came to over 120 USD. The clerk, who was the quintessential grandmother type, told me I was a “good little saver”. It’s distressing how nice that blatant untruth was to hear from this complete stranger. I wish I didn’t want approval as much as I do. It’s as if whenever someone says something nice to me I feel this gaping need inside of me, I immediately want them to say more nice things. My desire to please is sickening at times.

Speaking of which, my regular partner and I are overhauling our convention card once again. This time it is mostly for defense, most notably we’re abandoning the gray area of “standard” discards. At tournaments one is often asked by the opponents what sort of discards the partnership is using. Our answer up until now has been, “Standard,” which really doesn’t mean much as it boils down to a nebulous mix of attitude and suit preference signals. It was an unsatisfactory answer for the opponents (except insomuch as they could rest assured there wasn’t all that much information being transmitted). As for me, I spent a lot of time on defense trying to decipher which kind of signal I was receiving (let alone the message). It was apparent we needed a new system; now we have one and my job just got exponentially more difficult because now I have no excuse for missing a signal and in the meantime I have to make sure I’m sending the right messages to my partner with every card on every hand.

In bridge advancement is a halting series of struggles to attain a certain level of competency only to remain there just long enough to see how much further one has to go. I have years and years of this process to look forward to, lucky me. Of course, once in awhile, someone says something nice to me and that makes it all worthwhile … well, maybe not, but I do love the challenge and it serves to feed my competitive streak.

I like to think of myself as frugal, which is to say, I’m willing to spend money on certain important items. Hand cream is important … so are bubble baths.

Still the two most luxurious moments of my life were both free and simply the result of the thoughtfulness of others. The first came while I was in a hotel shower thinking murderous thoughts after a night of being kept both awake and captive by my parents sleeping in the next bed. My mother rapped on the bathroom door and while I was adding the indignity of sharing a bathroom to my list of complaints, she put a cup of hot, black coffee on the counter for me. Stepping out of the shower and being able to sip coffee while toweling off was totally luxurious.

Last night the dispatcher I was scheduled to relieve called to say she needed to leave early because she wasn’t feeling well. I wasn’t feeling particularly well either, but as I thought I would go in last night I opted to go ahead and do so early. I did manage to keep my coughing to one rather brutal fit this morning. I was dreading cleaning the snow off my car as I was sure the combination of the cold air and the exertion would bring on another such attack. A few minutes before I was scheduled to leave, a co-worker appeared in the dispatch area and asked if I had a spare key to my car. He told me he had already cleaned my car off for me and if I produced the spare key, he would go out and start it for me. Being able to walk out of the department and settle into a toasty warm vehicle for the drive home was also quite a luxury. Unbidden acts of kindness make life much more livable, just like expensive hand cream and ridiculously priced handmade soap.

The first week of the New Year finds me battling some sort of mutant killer death cold. It started in my chest, now it has taken up residence in my ears and sinuses as well. When I cough it hurts so bad I see stars. This afternoon I awoke with a fever. At the moment I am waiting for my hair to dry so I can venture out into the frigid air to buy some NyQuil® and at least one more box of tissue. In the past few days my nose has deforested several hundred acres. Chances are this is viral so I see little point in going to my doctor for an antibiotic, but I may have to go see him just to get a note for work. At this point a cough that results in a mouthful of warm blood really wouldn’t come as much of a surprise. Even the Beet Weasel seems to have realized I am not feeling well, because he’s being nice to me. I want my mommy.

I’ve just come home from a small game at the club. It was a very satisfying way to spend the last evening of 2009. The single most significant development in my life in the past year year was taking up bridge. It is kind of hard to believe that a year ago I had not even the foggiest idea of how the game was played, especially at the moment when I’m coming off a week in which I spent over forty hours at the table (the truly frightening thing is that I can’t yet say that I’ve found my limit, though I suspect I’m close).

And so, to paraphrase a friend of mine, in the coming year may all your trumps split evenly and may all your missing honors be onside.

Since I am obligated to appear at my place of employment tonight, I regretfully returned home today. It was a short trip, but well worth it even with the unfortunate incident with the car.

Last night while my grandmother and I were watching television she noticed some movement outside of the window. The movement was caused by the twitching of a set of ears and the ears belonged to a deer whose nose was a scant few inches from the window. It appeared to be staring in at us. We could see the face pretty well thanks to an electric candle illuminating the windowsill. The deer remained there for at least a minute. My grandmother commented that it must be like going to the zoo for the deer.

My drive back home was not eventful. There were signs on I-95 north of Baltimore advising of “Major Delays” ahead. Having experience with the sort of delays that do not warrant such a warning, I opted to take Highway 40 through the rest of Maryland and into Delaware. The lower speed limit and traffic lights seemed like the lesser of two evils. It too became congested, but only in and around the shopping areas.

I myself intend to descend into the heart of darkness that is the suburban shopping center on Christmas Eve. I need to go to the grocery store since there is very little in the way of food (with the exception of Christmas cookies) in the apartment at the moment and there won’t be much open tomorrow. Though I suppose I could always get some Chinese take-out to take to work with me tomorrow night.

Speaking of the apartment, I received a letter and a copy of my new lease from the management. I noted a particular turn of phrase in the former, “We thank you for continuing your stay …” While this doesn’t bother me on a personal level, I really do think that some people who think of this place as their home would be offended by the implication that it was only temporary — a very poor choice of words public relations wise.

I left very early this morning for Virginia, racing the dawn down the I-95 corridor. I managed to get past Baltimore before rush hour. My progress was fine until the last 100 yards. The driveway was not well plowed, and my attempt up the steep curved drive left me sliding and my front tires ended up over the edge of the asphalt and in the snow which quickly became mud. Eventually the sun and I cleared off the ice from the steepest section, AAA retrieved the car and I made it up the hill without further incident.

This morning I planted the Chia® Christmas tree I bought on clearance last year. I have never done one of these before; I was surprised by how effectively the two teaspoons of seeds turned the ¼ cup of water into goo in preparation for spreading on the terracotta base. I noted that this is the first year I’ll have a Christmas tree in this apartment.

My visions of ending up with a Chia® cat kept me from allowing the Beet Weasel to help despite the fact he seemed very interested in the process. Daniel implied that this made me a Scrooge.

Last night was another bad turn at the bridge tables for me. I didn’t play very well, though reviewing the hand record made me feel a bit better about my bidding. Part of the mediocre finish was due to a bit of bad luck with the movement, we played a good pair who found two slams which no one else bid. One of them was cold, one of them would have gone down had I made a different lead. It was one of the two leads I considered and I made the wrong choice. The second blow was that the team who came in last for North-South decided to leave before the last round, which was the round in which we were to play them. The presumably good boards we would have gotten against them, and that everyone else sitting East-West presumably did get from them, would have been helpful. These two things in concert with my shoddy performance were deadly.

I don’t know if there will be a game or not tonight at the club, but if there is I will likely play again. I made plans to play tomorrow night with the partner I met last week. On Thursday and Friday I’m playing in a NLM sectional with my regular partner. I hope that I perform better than I did last night. This week is shaping up to have a lot of bridge in it, though last night when I got home I actually wanted to play some poker online as a reprieve. At least with poker I can blame a bad result on luck.

The “Check Engine” light came on in my car recently, after checking the usual suspects did not provide an answer, I took it into the shop today. A very expensive repair and a tune-up later, the light is out, the car’s engine sounds better and the mechanic claimed I’d see even better gas mileage now. I’m trying to look on the bright side, but it seems I’ve bought a lemon — a lemon I like and enjoy driving, but a lemon nonetheless.

I’ve spent a couple of mornings going through the boxes I have in storage in a friend’s basement. It has felt like excavating someone else’s life, a strange experience. Things have changed so much just since I moved into this apartment, I hardly recognize my former self or selves, as the case may be. The disconnect is disconcerting. I have, however, been enjoying going through the books and getting them cataloged. Also I located a bookmark that I had been looking for, it is clear plastic filled with a clear fluid in which a small plastic goldfish can be made to “swim”.

It seems that about half the people in my department are sick. Last night I had a co-worker swear to me that bronchitis is not contagious and while I admit that the actual inflammation of her bronchial tissue might not be, the virus or bacteria most likely causing it most certainly is. It is around this time of year my arrival at work is almost always immediately followed with ablutions that involve almost every surface I might subsequently touch and the generous use of Clorox® Disinfecting Wipes. This process is a bit hard on my hands, but I think it is worth it as a tenacious cold can, upon reaching me, become tonsillitis before you can say, “Gesundheit!” There are few things I hate more than having tonsillitis.

In my darker moments, I find myself entertaining thoughts about vaccines that are antithetical to my thoughts on personal liberty. I don’t really think that people should be forced to get vaccinated, but I really do wish people would take responsibility for their illness when they are sick and stay home. Of course, we’ll see if I still feel that way the next time I have a cold and want to play bridge at the club.