I must be tired and overscheduled - two days in a row now I have been awakened out of a total sound sleep by my alarm. (Normally, I wake up at least five minutes before it's due to go off). Or my internal clock's messed up. Or something.

But I do think it's overscheduled: this is yesterday afternoon's house-leaving event -
walked out the door, locked it.

realized I didn't have the book for the Christmas cantata (I'm a narrator and this was the first time they wanted me to rehearse with them)

went back in, got it.

walked out the door, locked it.

realized it would be really dark when I got home and my night vision is horrible, so unlocked the door again and switched on the porch light so I can, you know, SEE to put the key in the lock when I get home.

locked the door, drove down the street.

realized halfway to church that I had two pans of "world famous" made-from-a-box-mix brownies sitting on my dining room table that I needed to take with me to the church.

kept going anyway because I needed to talk to the choir director before she started the singers warming up at 5:30

talked to her

went back home

got the brownies

brought them back

taught Youth Group

ate dinner

went and made a BIG GIANT BOLLIX of trying to read over the introductory music. There are about eight bars of the lead-in to the first song where I'm supposed to be quoting Isaiah and I couldn't figure out where in the music those eight bars fell. Seriously. I used to be able to read music and follow along. Or at least I thought I did. It might be that I only ever read treble-staff (former clarinet player). Or maybe it's the ghost of music performance anxiety that was originally implanted in my brain by Mr. A. and Mr. W. back in high school. But anyway. I almost cried in front of the choir because I screwed up so bad. One thing about me is that I'm really hard on myself if I don't do something up to my standards, especially if other people are observing me.

somehow got through the rest of the readings

went up to observe the end of youth group - apparently a minor fight broke out while I was not there, a ping-pong table got damaged, and my co-worker was lecturing the kids on behavior. (Unfortunately they are all too old to pull the Santa Claus thing on this time of year).

hung around so I could be sure the doors were locked after everyone left.

returned home and realized I forgot to change the time on my vcr when we went back to Standard Time, so instead of taping "Rudolph," it had taped the 6 pm local news and the 6:30 pm rerun of "Everybody Loves Raymond" instead. Again, I nearly cried: when I'm tired or otherwise frustrated, little things - little tiny stupid things - are enough to totally push me over the edge.

sat and knitted a couple of rows on the Fibonacci sweater. I will be really glad when it's time to divide off the sleeves on this; I've got it on my longest circular needle of the appropriate size and the stitches are getting very constrained. I know, I could probably incorporate a second circular needle and spread the stitches out more, but it seems that I'm overly good at dropping stitches on this project and I don't want to give them any more chances to run away from me. Was sad because even "Mythbusters" was a re-run that I had already seen several times.

went to bed around 9:30. Seriously, I'd go to bed at 8 pm if I could, I really need the sleep. But I also need personal time when I'm NOT sleeping, and the only way to get it some days is by pushing my bedtime back a little. (I get up at 5 am so going to bed much after 9:30 really isn't doable.)

And my calendar for next week, with my reminders to myself:

Tuesday: spiced nuts (departmental "we're not calling it a baby shower because we're superstitious and know you miscarried late once, but we want to do something for you before you leave" for one of the teaching assistants)

Wednesday: raspberry turkey meatballs (Arts and Sciences luncheon and I may not even get to eat because I have a class that runs till noon and another that starts at 1, and it's on the other side of campus).

Thursday: AAUW. Probably spiced nuts again. Or maybe another round of the meatballs if they turn out really well. (No. Probably not. They take 6 hours to cook in the slow cooker and I am not getting up an extra hour early to make $%(*&*$ meatballs.)

Monday of the following week: CWF potluck Christmas dinner, probably sweet potato casserole.

Seriously. I like cooking and all, but that feels like a bit much to me. (You must understand that these days, I regard it as a good dinner if I have time to wash my spinach salad before I eat it).