If every week were as bad as this week, and if I offered up every week, there would be no souls left in Purgatory.

Perhaps I shouldn't complain. I've had much worse weeks than this one. Still, that doesn't make me feel any better right now.

You may remember that a few weeks ago I wrote about the awkwardness that can arise when you talk about your priest friend for a while and then realize that the other person missed the part when you said your friend was a priest.

I talked to this person again. She told me that after thinking about it, she realized why she hadn't known that my friend was a priest.

When I said, "my priest friend," she thought I said, "my creep friend."

My "priest friend" said that perhaps both descriptions were accurate.

My computer programs frequently tell me that "an unexpected error" occured, or that the program encountered "an unexpected error."

I find it amusing that all of the programs insist that these errors are unexpected. First of all, does anyone ever describe an error as "expected"? I've never heard anyone say, "On my vacation I encountered an expected error when the airline lost my luggage."

I would, however, like my computer programs to be more honest with me.

They could say, "An error occurred. We expected that an error would occur at some point during your use of this program. However, we did not know which particular error would occur, so we will tell you this is an unexpected error. Do not ask what error occurred. This particular error was unexpected, so our programmers, not expecting this error, did not give us a message to explain what error occurred."

Or perhaps: "We expected this error but didn't care enough to prevent it. Sorry, but that's how we get you this software at a reasonable price."

Or: "Mistakes have been made. An error has occurred. We blame the previous administration. We will now work tirelessly to counteract these errors. If our efforts do not succeed, or if things get worse, we will continue to blame the previous administration."

Or: "An error occurred. We don't care. We are just legally obligated to let you know. Don't sue us or more errors will occur. And we still won't care."

My brother is currently agnostic. This makes for some interesting and occasionally frustrating conversations about religion and God with him.

When our family eats together, or even when he and I eat alone, we (or I) still pray before meals, ending our prayer with the Sign of the Cross.

My brother developed his own version of this. He'll touch his forehead and then his chest (like for Father and Son), but instead of touching his shoulders for the Holy Spirit, he'll shrug. It's his way of saying that he's not sure--he's agnostic.

It also strikes me as oddly appropriate given that the Holy Spirit gives us knowledge of the Father and the Son, that because my brother misses the Spirit he becomes unsure about the Father and the Son.

I do care about my brother's eternal salvation, and I definitely hope he returns to his faith. Even so, when (if) he does, I will miss his agnostic sign of the cross. I think it's funny.

1. On a 4.5 hour drive, air conditioning would be nice. Otherwise, you end up stinky. On the other hand, it is fun to go 60-70 miles an hour with the windows down. It's like the convertible experience, except with a roof. Also, expelling so much water in sweat allows you to go farther in between rest stops. Next time, though, I wonder if it would be worthwhile to bring a change of clothes and/or a portable shower.

2. I really need to get a GPS. Really. Otherwise I end up half an hour out of my way due to construction and have to call my brother: "I think I'm in Naperville. Can you tell me how to get home?" I also need a map to put in my car, so I can actually maybe find my way without GPS (you know, the old-fashioned way).

3. I can't wait to get an I-Pass. So many tolls, so few coins.

4. It's nice to take a road trip without needing to hitch a ride or borrow a car.

5. An MP3/casette adapter is awesome on a car ride, even if it has a few problems.

If I had a GPS, would it be blasphemous to download a Jesus directional voice?

http://pigtones.com/

If so, perhaps I would stick with the Govenator.

Of course, none of this really matters because I don't have GPS.

I've realized there's a problem with my favorite saint. "Athanasius" doesn't really fit on a license plate.

Last night I thought for the first time that I might be hallucinating. Sometimes on certain medications I still think I'm in my dream after I've woken up, but at least I'm not seeing anything that's not there; it just takes a little while before I can figure out that the person I'm trying to talk to isn't in the room, or that I'm having trouble solving a crossword puzzle because there is no crossword puzzle (yes, I have dreams about solving crossword puzzles). Sometimes it takes longer than others, but this is almost an anti-hallucination. I can see things as they are, but my brain can't recognize that what I see is reality for those few moments when it can't get out of the dream.

Last night was different. For one, I was still trying to fall asleep. For another, what I saw made no sense, and wasn't connected to any sort of dream. I was lying in bed, without glasses on, and saw the pill bottles on my desk. There are quite a few of them. I noticed that it looked like there was a light source on them, because in the dark of the rest of the room, they appeared to be glowing. It also seemed like the light was not constant, because the glowing pill bottles would flicker a bit. I mused that it was funny because with the flickering light and without my glasses it almost looked as if the lids of the pill bottles were dancing in place. Then I realized that there was no way the light from the window could be doing that to the pill bottles. I started to wonder if maybe instead of observing the effects of light on the pill bottles I had actually just hallucinated glowing pill bottles dancing in place. I was concerned enough about my mental state that I got up to check. I discovered that even though my computer was off, the light where the Ethernet cord was plugged in was on, and the yellow light below that was flickering. The mysterious vision of pill bottles was not a sign of my mental health; it was merely a product of having a broken wireless router.

By the way, during the brief period when I wondered if I was having a hallucination, I remember thinking that I'd be really annoyed if I was. If I'm going to hallucinate, I'd like to see something cooler than flickering pill bottles. Even if I can't see an elephant or a purple dog or something else crazy, at least let the pill bottles dance around the desk or something instead of just flickering (dancing) in place.

I will need a car for grad school. Given that I will be a grad student, I really need a utilitarian vehicle. That means I need a car that is inexpensive, runs well, and has studied Jeremy Bentham and John Stuart Mill.

Today, while sorting laundry, I used the word anathema. I was debating whether to put a black item in with the load of light clothes I was doing, because I thought that the black probably wouldn't bleed. I almost put it in my laundry bag, but then I thought, "It's such a dark black, it's clearly anathema to a load of light clothes." It took a few moments before I realized that anathema is not the word most people would use to describe sorting laundry.

It can result in an awkward conversation when you tell someone about your relationship with your priest friend, and they ask a lot of questions, and only after about 5 minutes of confusion on both ends do you discover that the person missed the part where you mentioned your friend was a priest.

So, I was going to try and post about something other than my sleep schedule, but this is something that deserves note. I took my sleeping pill at maybe 12:00, but it usually doesn't work anymore until an hour or two has gone by. (Saturday night/Sunday morning it didn't work at all.) I decided that I would write a quick e-mail at around 12:30. While writing the e-mail, I remembered that I was going to experiment by trying a higher dosage of the Lunesta, because I'm currently at mid-dose. So at about 1:00 I took a half pill to help. The next time I got up, I checked the time, because I was pretty dizzy and felt tired. Apparently the "quick e-mail" ended up taking over 2 hours to write.

The thing is, with the higher dosage of Lunesta, I may actually have been able to fall asleep if I had gone to bed instead of finishing the "quick e-mail". I could probably fall asleep now if I got off the computer now. But it's less than 10 minutes before 3:00am, and I feel like I should listen to the Mathbox 20 song 3 AM at 3:00am. So now I want to stay up until 2:58 or 2:57 so that I can start playing the song then and be able to listen to "3 AM" at 3a.m.

Edit at 3:01am:
My "3AM" at 3:00am was a success!

It is approximately 6:30 in the morning. Typically, I would say that this means I am up early. However, I have been trying to sleep for almost 8 hours and have not yet managed it. Does that mean I'm up late?

I've been having a lot of double vision issues lately. Sometimes it takes real effort to make my eyes focus; it's like they'd rather be cross-eyed. This is really annoying when I'm trying to read. I'm not sure if it's a health concern, a medication side-effect, or just a random occurrence (I'll talk to my doctor about it next time I see her), but for now, I will try and take advantage of it. How? I just requested three Magic Eye books from the local library.

I had some true crime novels on hold at the library. Today, I went to pick them up.

I've wanted to get some light reading for the summer. Not light in subject matter (true crime certainly isn't very cheerful), but light in terms of mental effort required to read them.

In an effort to expand my summer reading beyond true crime, I browsed at the library to find some other interesting books. I ventured into the non-fiction section, because there are often some very interesting books there.

I came out of the library with a book called The Last Superstition, a philosophical refutation of the "New Atheism" espoused by Dawkins et al. So much for light reading.

Today I completed my first New York Times Saturday crossword puzzle. Saturday puzzles are the hardest, and this is the first one I've completed without needing to look up the answers. I feel smart now.

Yesterday I went through my departmental graduation ceremony. It was actually very nice, and it was the first time it really hit me that I was done with undergrad, and done with the U of I. I was surprised at how excited all of my professors seemed; I would think that seeing graduations every year would eventually become repetitive and boring, but they all seemed very proud even of the non-Classics people graduating, most of whom I assume my professors don't even know. I think it was their excitement and pride that made me excited and proud to be graduating. I also discovered that Classics professors do not hug their students until the students have graduated, and then all of us get hugs from everyone. I will miss them.

Thanks to lots of prayers, an understanding professor, and a visit to my doctor, I was actually able to complete all of my exams on schedule. On Monday that seemed almost impossible. Thank you all for your prayers.

I am in desperate need of prayers. I don't want to go into it any more than that, but I would appreciate prayers. Thanks.

Today, our shower fell apart. I might not shower for a few days. I can't smell body odor, but other people can, and I am nervous that I will smell awful and not realize it.

Also, I found a video online. I don't know if I mentioned it, but my wonderful dog Penny (pictured in the userpic) would smile. Not the stupid smile where the dog opens its mouth and people say it is smiling. I mean a lip-lifting, teeth-showing smile. I found this great video online that demonstrates what a real dog smile looks like.

http://www.maniacworld.com/scary-smiling-dog.html