It's a pity I'm not unemployed today. It's sunny and a balmy 73 degrees out there. I would very much like to be out, taking a long walk or even a nap in the park.

No, I don't know yet when I'm going to be actually unemployed. Conversations continue to range from "a couple of weeks" to scenarios that sound more like a couple of months. I'm okay with that--more paychecks are always good. On the strength of continued, even if short-term, employment, I applied a huge chunk of my modest cash reserves toward decreasing my still-painful credit card balance.

Getting at least one more paycheck than I anticipated also justifies (in my mind) a wild and extravagant shopping spree over the coming weekend. I'm going to take my fifty bucks of "mad money (hoarded winnings from scratch-off lottery tickets, my "birthday" cash from the company, and the results of cashing in my bag o'loose change) and indulge myself in a desperately needed new pair of shoes. Maybe two, if DSW is offering good prices.

Okay, "extravagant" could be a bit much, but it's fifty bucks I would have saved for groceries if I'd wound up unemployed this Friday.

Less drama, more blogging, that's me this week. I don’t know why. My commitment to the job is as strong as it ever was--my commitment is always the same. As long as they keep paying me, I keep doing the work. I guess it's possible that I overdid the work a bit. Things were so quiet last week that I tore through my usual workload in a hurry, under the assumption that it was a lull and as storm was coming. So far this week--no tempest.

I don't really know how to deal with two quiet weeks in a row. It's a bit dangerous that there are so many good books online and available to read at any idle* moment. (But I'm being strong.)

Am I boring or what?

The coolest new online time-wasting toy I've found this month is the Addictomatic. Type in whatever you're interested in and it sweeps around the internet, scooping in related posts, tweets, articles, videos, and images. It's also a cool place to find a collection of other web-hoovering programs.

It's good for tracking when your friends are talking about you, if they use a dozen different venues online and you don't have time to check all of them separately. *

I occasionally type in the 'Nut corporate identity, just to see if anyone is talking about us, but what I like better is to type in something bizarre (yellow balloon) (baby giraffe) (blip) and see if it can come up with any related posts.

It takes very little to amuse me sometimes.

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* Speaking of idleness?

Now, this is a subject on which I flatter myself I really am au fait. The gentleman who, when I was young, bathed me at wisdom's font for nine guineas a term--no extras--used to say he never knew a boy who could do less work in more time; and I remember my poor grandmother once incidentally observing, in the course of an instruction upon the use of the Prayer-book, that it was highly improbable that I should ever do much that I ought not to do, but that she felt convinced beyond a doubt that I should leave undone pretty well everything that I ought to do.

I have an unending passion for Jerome K. Jerome.

* * Sometimes, ego-surfing in this fashion can be scary. What is it that makes people think some randomly inspired, half-baked post on a topic someone knows nothing about--what is it that makes them think it's worth dredging up five or six years later?

Do not cite me as a source, people! I don't know nothing and I don't got no credentials to prove it!