I should be asleep.

All weekend while the weather was good I sulked it right down the drain by dwelling on mistakes. I should have been standing on that little bridge waiting for a train to come by, trying to see the faces in the windows. I should have been sitting with friends and smiling at how good they are instead of sitting at home and frowning about jerks. Anyway, tomorrow I'm going to be better, it's just that I keep forgetting how to have a nice time.

Tonight I stomped around on a long, unsuccessful errand. It was barely raining and just cold enough to make me walk extra quickly, just cold enough to make coming inside after so long feel really good. Things are looking up, sort of. I put the record player in the kitchen, and it liked the idea so much that it started working again.

That's the way I repair things that are broken, I put them away for a long while and then abruptly bring them back out, usually while I'm in the middle of something else. This time I was in the middle of watching a television show about a policeman who travelled back in time, or something. I thought, "Time to try the record player," and paused the show to go and do it. Once I found that it was working I needed an excuse to stay in the kitchen for a while, so I got out the package of jello that I'd found in the cupboard when I first moved in, that had been in there for who knows how long before. Jello lasts forever. I used too much water, so it may never set properly, but it was pretty good anyway. The volume was turned way up, and it smells really nice when the gelatin is dissolving in the hot water, like a giant bowl of orange tea. Your whole life gets better when you have a record player in the kitchen.

Now I'm trying to work my way towards sleepiness without a book, because I think that if I start reading now I won't stop until it's light out. I'm working on sleeping better, I'm working on dreaming better. I keep dreaming while I'm not entirely asleep, and that's only good as a once in a while thing. Francis and I had a talk about sleep paralysis versus night terrors, and it seems to me that night terrors are just a waste of time. I wanted to ask, "When you scream, is it all high-pitched and shrill, or is it more like shouting?" but it didn't seem like the time. Maybe I can ask him tomorrow. I'm really pretty curious about screaming, I guess because it's something I've never been able to do myself.

I have to try another way to sleepiness. I'm going to try a radio and closed eyes and working on remembering how to have a nice time.