"God, I'm tired." I've been getting up early again. At least.. ten days? I don't know. Maybe more. I woke up at 9 the day before yesterday, and that's the latest it's been. Frequently, it's before 6. I am okay with this - happy, even - but I wish I wouldn't get so tired. Going to sleep early is one thing, but every day I want a nap. And I'm tired after I wake up, even though most nights I get enough sleep. I'm always tired. What do I need? More green things in my diet? Probably. More exercise? Probably. I need to find exercises I can do without hurting myself. It seems like every task is a risk for my back. I've got a pillow wedged between my body and the back of my desk chair as I write. I'm sure the desk/chair height ratio doesn't help.

Yesterday was Halloween, and I spent almost eight hours hunched over my desk, finishing my damn Celeste mask. And that was after the work I'd already done on it. We had fun, but I felt bad for Dan. It's one of his favorite things, you know? Throwing parties, specially Halloween and Christmas. And we still tried to make it a thing this year. He made the yard look so nice, we ran an extension cord from the house for the crockpots of food, we built a fire. Between a Frankenstein and a spooky ghost staked into the ground, we ran a clothesline and clipped peanut butter cups to it, spaced out. No doubt kids would come by anyway, and there's no sense in shaming a kid, they've had it hard too. But we only had one, at the end of the night, while we were cleaning up after everyone left. She showed up in a car behind me while I was poking the fire around, and scared me half to death. We tried to get her take more candy, but she took two Reese's cups and left. Kids these days.

His sister came. She and I sat outside waving at traffic while he finished setting up. Waving at cars became a fun game to me. If I thought half a face mask gave me a freedom, a full mask gave me a whole soul. After it got dark, periodically I would wander out by the street and cock my head at people and wave, or turn my head toward the sky to look for stars through the clouds. Because I am, you know, a super nerd.

Jill and Stu showed up later, not until after dark, because Stu had to work until 6. At some point Stevie came by, but she was only here for maybe a half an hour? Times have changed, and this year, greatly so.

The temperature was low, but it might have been alright, especially near the fire, except for the wind. It started early and got stronger and stronger. If I were a witchy lady instead of a cartoon owl, I could have used to this to some sort of advantage. As it was, I was concerned whirling embers would catch my felt on fire.

All in all, it was nice, but not at all what Halloween usually is, or a party for that matter. And as we're older, and the people around us have kids, it's hard to get people to come to parties anyway.

I asked him how he felt about it. He said he'd set his bar low, so it at least met that. I said, yes, but what do you feel? He said, is there a word for disappointed even though you didn't expect much? I told him I don't know if there's a word for it, but there should be, because it's definitely a familiar feeling.

Let's hope that feeling doesn't bleed into the rest of the week.

I keep saying something about making a plan for Tuesday and the rest of the week, but I haven't really. I'm just going to do the general thing of "being chill." That's my plan. Go vote, come home, tie some pillows around my head, and write, if I can. There could definitely be some outside time - we're jumping up into the mid to high 60's. At least there's that.

The daylight savings trickery has occurred. Cool! There will be sunlight earlier if I continue to wake up early. Uncool! The sun will go down at 5 pm. To begin. Yay...

I drank apple juice and now my head hurts. Is this psychosomatic?