Time starts and stutters, abstracts in its old age. Hardly ever stays out late anymore.

Once I was lost in a library that contained all the books that will ever be written. I searched for my own, of course, but the spines showed only the titles, stamped in silver foil, not the names of the authors. Many of the words were alien to me, though I could read them all. Their meanings didn't yet exist, not for me.

After hours of searching, I gave up. Maybe I never wrote a book. And if I did, what good would it do to read it? I'd still have to write it myself eventually.

I escaped the labyrinth of books by morning.

Spent part of the afternoon discussing perception and reality with Ben O. I think we made some progress.

Might be time to obtain a new computer desk. Something little and lean for laptop writing. Next to my bed, because that's where it belongs.

Work it into the routine. Work, come home, walk/play video games, eat dinner, write, shower, read, bed. That could work out.

Modify it for the weekend, start with walk/play video games, go from there. Naps are important.

Early voting ballot is still in progress. So many judges. Still something unsettling about electing judges. Shouldn't I not be able to influence the interpretation of the law by rejecting those I don't agree with? Everything's arguable, of course, but precedent leads to precedent.

Better stick to the current plan of avoiding judges entirely.

Movie theaters and battlegrounds.

Sunday and yesterday I felt what I still recognize as depression. Wisps of it cling to me today. I've learned that I can slow down, even a lot, but as long as I keep moving I come out of it. As much as I can, I guess. Desire comes and goes, yet my tree of stubbornness is perennial, and bears fruit always. Habit and routine and hungry dogs that wake me up for breakfast also help.

This Halloween I do not feel like myself. Only unusual thing this weekend was the couple of drinks I had. I guess it has been a while since I've had any alcohol. Months. It doesn't come up often enough for me to compare. Wait, last month I had a Hibiscus, cranberry juice and champagne. Just one.

People at work expressed disappointment at my lack of costume. After my elaborate costume last year, they were expecting something even more dark and sinister. I've been contemplating going up to them and whispering "You will outlive everyone you love." That would be scary. Especially if I could shed a single tear. Yes, a fortune teller. Throw some dice, flip some coins, consult some tea leaves, and then shed the tear and whisper. Unsettling at least.

I can't remember where I heard the line. I think it was Adventure Time? Somebody needed the crystal tears of a turtle. Oh, Cake the Cat making flapjacks. That was one of the ingredients she gathered.

I could try and reassure them that the fortunes aren't true because time is an illusion, but that never makes people feel better.

Blogger didn't always have the Autosave feature. I remember losing posts because the Publish failed. Doubtful that it really matters. I assume there's a regression to the mean in all things, and after ups and downs everything will start coming out roughly the same.

Send in diamonds and traps. That's what they really need.

Nerve and spleen and woven wicker legs.

Ticking clocks can simulate a heartbeat, digital clocks simulate an emptiness.

Anvil. Bear. Cardigan. Dredge. Ephemera. Flower, red plastic fabric hair clip that smelled like you for months. Glowing streetlights. Hair across your face. Intimacy in stolen spaces. Jargon. Kelp. Late nights. Moon rocks. No idea how that movie ended. Over. Past present future tense. Quiet snoring. River rocks. Sparring partner. Tango. Ulterior cake. Vesper. Wilco. Exact. Years and years. Zzz...

Sometimes things are going well...suspiciously well. It's probably nothing to not worry about.

I can close my eyes and feel like I'm at some center point, an equal distance from everything.

It's soothing AND unsettling.

Send out a thought like casting a line for a fish. See what it snags.

My commute to work is similar to my old job at the animal rescue. The street I work on, Utopia, is also well known to me. Every morning my drive is paved with memories. Racing against my own ghosts. Sometimes I wonder whose ghost I am, what future self is looking back on me. Memory is strange like that. It seems like we shouldn't remember the future.

What then, perspective? Is all this perspective colluding to cloud my present vision? I sit in my center looking out, while circled by possible selves looking in? None of us doing anything but looking, knowing that if we were going to do something we would have already done it? That whatever is going to happen may as well have already happened, because we're stuck here, trapped between mirrors?

It's probably for the best that we're all ghosts to each other. We'd probably irritate ourselves so much we'd engage in frequent fisticuffs and get nothing done.

Walking on the treadmill while playing games doesn't allow my mind to wander much. I wonder if that's a problem. The once-myriad possibilities are solidifying, like egg yolk on a china plate.

Might not be so bad; might be a little less crowded, at least.

I have no idea what's going on. Extensive rearranging and redecorating is happening around the house. Partly inspired by Halloween and the party Kelly is throwing. We're throwing. I'm throwing it too, of course, but I'm so unreliable around the holidays it's possible I'll just take 3 shots immediately, then get tired and go lie down like last year.

No costume has inspired me. I went as Eileen, Hunter of Hunters from Bloodborne last year. I spent a couple hundred bucks and 2 weeks building it. Not so this year. Nothing has struck me in the fancy.

My poor, unstruck fancy.

Shout-Out to Erma. I got the expansion for Betrayal at House On the Hill: Widow's Walk. We must play.