My list of things to do feels terrifyingly long and filled with the sort of annoying stuff that could take forever or could not.

Example: I’ve been hearing weird noises, which at first I attributed to the dogs, or visitors, but yesterday all visitors were gone, the dogs were with me, and I still heard weird noises. I’m thinking animal(s) living in my walls, and probably not mice. It’s not little skittering noises, but banging and thuds. So somehow I need to find out what’s visiting me and get rid of it. Could be a big job, could be a little job.

Second example: I took down the Christmas tree but I haven’t put away the ornaments. I left them all piled on the window seat and the chairs and the floor. So they need to get put away, but I have no idea how long it will take and it probably depends on how carefully I put them away.

Third example: writing a book. Oh, wait, I know that one’s a big job. Bigger than it should be because I started over again right before Christmas and am back on Chapter 3. Bad me. I’m not throwing everything out, though, just… well, just a lot of it. I am so appalling impractical as a writer. So adding a fourth huge job, find a real job that pays me money so that I can continue to be impractical when it comes to writing, without letting the dogs starve. Well, or me starve either, but I fell in love with CostCo’s dark chocolate sea salt caramels in December and it was not good for me. I’ve got some room to go before I’m starving.

Meanwhile, though, my entire face hurts because my jaw has locked up. I’ve had Temperomandibular joint problems since I was a teenager — and ugh, that wikipedia link is depressing. This is the worst pain I’ve had from it since I was seventeen and I’ll probably be headed to the doctor later this week, when I’m sure my new health insurance is active. But maybe not since wikipedia tells me that there aren’t really any effective treatments, other than what I’ve been working on myself already — trying to relax and lower my stress level.

Ha, and I just realized that I’m missing yoga because I got distracted by that long wikipedia post and my phone’s in my purse so the alarm didn’t remind me that it was time to go. How’s that for irony? R would point out that I’m misusing the term, or rather using it in today’s conventional (yet non-dictionary approved) meaning of an unfortunate coincidence. So yeah, it’s an unfortunate coincidence that I was too busy thinking about feeling stressed and reading about the physical consequences of said stress to make it to my life’s best de-stressor. Alas.

But that brings me back to my resolution: to take one thing at a time. How’s that for a nice straightforward resolution? And the current next thing will be to finish this blog post and go find some breakfast that doesn’t require chewing.