Please, let me explain!

1. My computer is currently on bed rest.
2. It has been since late last week.
3. My father's computer, which I have been using in the meantime, does not go to sites I find important, namely Gmail, NEUmail, and Blogger.
4. It really isn't right to update at work.
5. I am sorry.

The problem with Lent for lapsed Catholics.

I don't know if this is true for real Catholics, but for me, Lent is a second shot at making a New Year's resolution. It's shorter than a year, and for that reason it's less daunting. At the same time, it's long enough to form a habit. Best of all, nobody will sabotage your goals of giving things up, because for all they know, it's for religious reasons.

This year, I thought it would be a good time for me to give up cookies. Not that I want to go the rest of my life without cookies, but I'd like to feel like I could live a day without Famous Amos. It's a weird addiction of mine, one that I don't really like, one that actually gives me the shakes if I try to stop. I've been doing well, except...

IT'S GIRL SCOUT COOKIE TIME.

I mean, hello, forget Famous Amos. I woke up this morning with visions of Egg Beaters and toast dancing in my head, and sitting on my kitchen table were two boxes - Caramel deLites (misleading!) and Thin Mints, my two favorites. I told my roommate about my predicament, the green box already torn in my hands, and she told me her mother bought her some she didn't want. Lemonades. The ones they just came out with that I wanted to try so badly but didn't want to blow four dollars on in case they suck (which I'm sure they won't, because Girl Scout Cookies categorically taste good and have crack as an unlisted ingredient, I'm sure).

Sabotage, I tell you.

I don't feel guilty about it, but damn nevertheless.

Readership at historic lows.

Why is it that as soon as I pledged to my dear readers that I would post regularly, both for their entertainment and my need for masturbatory ramblings, absolutely nobody visited this site at all?

Not that anybody cares that much, but I had grown used to getting about 10 hits a day, if mostly for the lyrics of "Would You?" and "Spooky". It's as if the real joy of people who read my blog is finding only purely accidental entries made by me, and that even Google is boycotting One Falling Star on account of its recent resolution to ramble on purpose.

I bought a new CD!

It's been a while since I've done this. And it took me a long time to realize that I needneedneeded "Andrew Bird and the Mysterious Production of Eggs". Two years, in fact.



I don't know what I like most about this CD. Could be the Rufus Wainwright-esque voice, or the fact that M. Ward is thanked in the liner notes (which, by the way, are peppered with drawings as delightful as the cover). It could just as easily be the song "Fake Palindromes", which Jon had me listen to in the text office at the Coop, and which was still the only song I'd heard off the album until about ten minutes ago.

With that in mind, I'm sure it's too early to pick favorites. I can, however, say that this CD is already ranked among my favorite CDs that I own, and it isn't even on my iPod yet.

What's scary right now.

Bodily concerns are not something I worry my head about too frequently. I do alright for myself. I play by the rules, may cut a few corners, but for the most part, I'm a healthy individual that doesn't give her body much thought because I can almost guarantee that I'm [physically] okay.

I recently discovered that a friend of mine is at risk for cancer. Cancer.

Oh, my grandmothers both died of it, my mother has had countless biopsies that came out negative, but somehow I am so much more detached from those situations than I am from my friend's.

Possibly it is because she is so near to me in age. Possibly it's because I am suddenly one to rely on. My mother secretly relies on me, but I was born, conceived, in her care. There's something almost unnatural about the idea of her leaning on me in a time of personal struggle. Not the case with my friend.

She is in many ways my rock, and I hers, though admittedly not as often as I should. And now, being put to the test leaves me wishing there was something more personal, something more, period, that I could do to make the fear and the scarier speculation disappear.

You see, I think it's hard, in a way, to be the one who isn't going through it. I can see why she's upset, I can see why she's afraid. Already she is handling this better than I ever could, but I can't help in such a way that I know what it is like for her, can tell her everything will be okay - who am I kidding, I wouldn't be able to do that anyway. But I really wish I could try.

In like a lion...

Without a doubt, it has been too long since my last update. I hereby announce my new month's resolution (because, in spite of evidence to the contrary, I am quite often a realist): For the month of March, I will update my blog at least three times a week. I'm not counting this wimpy half week.

I started this blog so that I would have an outlet for my more structured commentary and otherwise creative writing, but it doesn't work so well if I do not apply myself to it. It is with this in mind that I pledge to you, dear readers, that you will hear a whole lot more from me.

At least for this month.