A while back I was craving the Austin of Billy Lee Brammer's "The Gay Place."�It's been a long while since I read it but one of its most vivid imagesin my mind was the writer sitting in his Austin apartment in the night,typing on his typewriter, in the days before air conditioning.� I could feel the sweat rolling� rolling down his neck and imagine how hot and uncomfortable that had to be.� I guess you should be careful what you wish for.� Our air conditioning went out today.� I didn't notice it because I was doing outside work and hadn't turned it on since I was in and out of the house a lot and didn't want to waste it. Mark got home from Houston and was quite perturbed to find it non-functioning.�So, now, here I sit in my Austin house beside an open window with the ceiling fan kicking around the stale air and no lights on anywhere to avoid warming anything up.� Of course, it's April and this is like an icebox compared to what this will be in August.� Our thermometer shows it to be 71 outside and 77 in the house.� I'm quite comfortable at this range but Mr. Freeze will want icicles on the ceiling and will be uncomfortable when he comes home.

I had a good day doing the gardening thing.� I mowed and planted and dug and repotted and ferilized and sweat and got really really grimy.�It was fun.� I pulled up a lot of my poppies that were shading the mums and other soon-to-bloom plants.� I got some house plants repotted that have needed it for a year.� Still plenty to do, including just cleaning off the porch covered in potting soil and empty plastic pots,but it was a good feeling to get so much done.

Yesterday was quite fun too.� My biggest problem, and I don't know quite how to solve this mental irregularity, is that I cannot get started on anything because before I can do that I need to do something else.� For example,this is not a true example, but let's say I'm lying in bed in the morning and I think to myself, "I'd like to be a doctor!"� Before I can get far with that thought I realize that that requires years of schooling which would require I get my transcripts from past colleges and I start thinking about what a chore that is, just sending off those letters and checks with requests for transcripts, then I realize that I would probably have to take some sore of GRE or GMAT or LSAT or something for school.� What a drag.� I've been there and done that and that doesn't sound like much fun.� I keep working back further and further in this puzzle to "what comes first" and end up stymied by the whole project so I read the paper, drink coffee and write e-mails and read journals.� This is my life.� I know, I know, I used to be a motivational speaker, I know all the tricks.� Just start, do anything, make a list, prioritize, etc. etc.� Even yesterday, I wanted to buy some garden supplies, but I also needed bird seed, which you can get at a garden store, but if I'm going to the garden store I really need to take back that beautyberry I bought last year that died.� I go in search of the beautyberry receipt, which I had miraculously saved and found a week or so ago but now it is nowhere to be found.� Okay, I'll skip the beautyberry.� But I really should finish the curtain I'm sewing for the bathroom.� So that means a trip to the fabric store.� For what?� I don't know how to sew a curtain, I don't know what else I need to make it work.�And by the time I go through all of these thoughts, I'm suffering a headache from too much thought and not enough food.� All I'd eaten through these hours of debate was some sunflower seeds and gingersnap cookies.

Last night was fun too.� I went to see Grace and her lovely family and her good friend Rita.� Grace's husband knows how to cook and had smoked a fabulous chicken.� Great meal and lots of fun talking.� I would love to have more intelligent, well spoken, and funny friends like Grace and Rita.� Or maybe I should just be around them a lot more.�We laughed and laughed.� We compared our early "sex education" while working in high school at Taco Bell and McDonald's.� Not that we HAD sex, just that we learned many new terms and concepts while working with older co-workers.� We played cards and I hadn't played cards in so long that I really enjoyed that more than I thought I would.� I want us to do it again soon.� Mark doesn't like games so we'll have to keep doing this while he's out gigging.� I want to invite these intelligent three and some others to partake of Scattergories with me.� Yes, I know that game is SO yesterday, but I love it and love to play it and haven't played it in 7 years.

I was also brave tonight, in my quest to be braver, and I went to a new Chinese place for dinner.� We haven't found a really good Chinese buffet in this town (which is a very good thing because the one in our last town was probably responsible for 15 of these extra pounds at least).� I haven't even had Chinese much at all since we've moved.� 1st Wok is on First and Stassney and doesn't look like much from the outside but it was very nice and very good.� I had Moo Shu Pork, which I adore and they did a good job.� I need to go for a lunch meal.� I like the soup and the egg roll and the whole meal bit and I'm too cheap to get that for myself on dinner prices.

The house feels cool enough to me that I can probably go sleep like a baby and even snuggle under the quilt once it the house cools off to 70.