Inexplicable Funk

Did you ever have one of those days where you just woke up in a blue funk, even though there was no real reason for it?

That was me today. It wasn't that noticeable when I first woke up, but as the day wore on, the cloud above my head became more and more defined until it wasn't long before it was a pretty well-defined black cloud.

The frustrating things about these sorts of days is that, even though we recognize them, we seem to be powerless to do anything to turn them around. We can sense the cloud forming and, rationally, we know there is no reason for it ... but we just can't seem to turn the ship around and head for sunnier waters. It's like one of those dreams where something unidentified, but menacing, is coming to get you, but you just can't seem to move.

Odder still about today was the fact that it was a warm, sunny day. We don't typically get those in January, even in Texas. I could have understood being in a funk if this had been our 23rd day without seeing the sun or if it was bone-chillingly cold and I ached all over from cold. But it was warm. The sun was shining. I was pretty much caught up on the things I needed to do around the house. In short, there was no reason on earth to be in a funk.

And yet, there I was . . . in a funk.

And still am at 10:15 at night.

Maybe tomorrow will be better.

Please Resuscitate

You might have noticed that my entries into this blog are as sparse as pieces of chicken in a can of store-brand chicken-noodle soup. I take full responsibility for that. Between living a life that can only be described as plain vanilla and also spending every waking moment taking care of the staggering responsibilities of being staggeringly responsible, there hasn't been much time to write a blog nor material to fill it with. It all makes for a deafening silence.

But all of that is about to change. I'm resuscitating (or resurrecting, if you prefer) this blog, this tenuous and intermittent connection of mine to the outside world. No, it wasn't a New Year's resolution that condemned me to a year of writing in my blog. It wasn't a sudden uptick in the incidence of interesting incidents in my life that is inspiring me to hunt and peck feverishly at the keyboard. It wasn't a sudden epiphany or a blinding flash of inspiration. I'm not sure what it was. It was just a sudden and intense desire to write again. You know, like I used to do when I was in high school and college and flush with what I mistook for ideas and talent. Bottom line, I enjoy writing, gosh darn it.

This time, however, things will be different.

How, you ask? A very prescient question. I congratulate you.

My style for the past few years has been to write long, rambling monologues about my day or some topic that interested me on that day (a style that this very entry is in danger of falling victim to). But I'm going to try something new. I'm going to write short, single-topic blogs. Perhaps these little nuggets or nodules of blogicity will encourage my dear readers to comment on them since they are no longer put off by the eye-glazing length of the entries. Now my blog entries will be more like reading a filler anecdote in Reader's Digest and less like reading a co-worker's old college thesis on the effects of migratory patterns of the wandering albatross on squid populations.

So, let the blogging begin (anew). Let the terseness flow. Viva la succinction.