Most people get bored when you tell them about your dreams. And I understand why. I mean, all of those non sequiturs, jump-cuts, complete absences of logic-- they're like a Fellini film. Even the closest friend's subconscious is a scarily uninteresting place to visit.

Which is why when I shared last night's dream with Melica via email-- featuring a boarding house, sketchy party guests taking showers, and a stolen laptop-- I was so pleasantly surprised that she jumped right into its possible interpretations, including the following quote which made me double-over with laughter:

"And you also may have been onto something clairvoyant with the shower scene. I sometimes don't take one. That's right. Unemployment days when I know I'm not going to see anyone-- I don't shower. (Though I wish I had on the day I wore my brown polyester pants, '80's red fleece pullover, inside-out socks, rubber-banded ponytail hair from the night before, and no makeup and then promptly ran into the biggest gossip, mean-spirited woman from my high school, who I hadn't seen since high school. Especially when I had to tap-dance around her where-are-you-working-these-days questions-- which, judging by my appearance, could have been 'my local shelter.')"

The best part of Melica is her enthusiasm for deconstructing every situation: a date, an interview, a dream. I'm just happy to produce the kind of material that allows her to truly shine.

Just a little over 24 hours after dumping the final deliverables for my nightmare project on the client's doorstep, I'm bored.

I'm caught up. Or at least as caught up as I need to be at this very moment in time. I actually had to start a whole new list because the ignored list of bastard tasks that had been following me around for weeks is finally all complete. So I had to sit down with my thinking cap and dream up more things to do-- those ideal things that never get done because there is never enough time-- Developer evaluations, client standard issues, and planning a project wrap-up.

And now that I'm back to having a life, I need to dream up a whole new list for it as well: a trip to NYC, drinks for Denise's birthday, oodles of thank you notes, researching our trip out West, taxes, movies-movies-movies, responding to an overflowing inbox of emails, and more whirlygirl essays.

Plenty to keep the homefires burning-- for a little while at least.

So this afternoon I found myself with a deadline that had been met for a project that I'm more than ecstatic to see end and an invitation to be in the studio audience of CNN's Crossfire at the Jack Morton auditorium at George Washington University. Other than a very tall, very full glass of Shiraz, this seemed like the perfect way to celebrate my re-emergence into that thing called life.

And here is what I realized during the one-hour live broadcast: I'm sort of uncomfortable clapping for the tired partisan Democrat ideas. And I'm definitely uncomfortable clapping when asked the simple question: "How many Democrats do we have out there in the audience?" I'm a little tired of the labels and the boxes and the all-or-nothing platforms. I've turned into a clap-for-the-ideas-you-believe-in-and-not-because-the-person-on-the-left-is-saying-them kind of girl.

Imagine that.

So first, Erika mailed me the Nick Hornby book. (Sidebar: Todd wrote to tell me that he thinks Nick Hornby gets way too much airtime on whirlygirl-- angry in a way that suggested he was going to issue some kind of FCC antitrust warrant for Hornby's arrest. So I just had to bring him up again today.)

And then today, a big envelope from Janet arrived containing a copy of January 4th's Columbus Dispatch with all of the Big Game's celebratory coverage. She wrote a note to tell me that she went out that morning to buy copies for all of her out-of-town Ohio State friends and that she hoped it would incite much dancing and singing and smiling.

Just the sight of it did. And likely it will incite even more when I get around to pouring over it after the evil-project deadline has passed.

Thanks, Janet. Go Bucks!