Means to an end.

I am looking at the clock, and though I don't have it exact, I think I have now been awake for 36+ hours. Understand, this is not triumphant thing for me, I outgrew this "how cool it is to never sleep" thing sometime in college, and more than anything I would like to go to bed right now. But my eyes are dry, and my lips are chapped, and I have found a reservoir of second winds I never even knew I had. I feel no more tired than I would had I awoken no more than 12 hours ago, and I see now reason why I shouldn't try and recap the past two days.

After talking to several people, Casey and John included, I've more or less decided that the reveal of "The Trendsetter" will be in the hands of the foul-mouth, Kevin Smith-inspired mailman who I'd been all but against putting in. Admittedly, every fiber of my being tells me that the mailman character has no business in this short -- but all told, when no other ideas could be conjured up among the smartest of my friends, every agreed that the mailman method sounded clever, and I should pursue it. Here, I will take off my professional hat and admit that even then, I had decided against using such a character for the reveal, until I was in bed two nights ago, and the dialogue started pouring out of the character and onto the page of nearby yellow legal pad.

Is it perfect? Not yet. But I feel like it's the best way to go.

That was most of my night Tuesday after I checked in here, short of a few extra panic attacks and hours of scribbling in the early-morning light. I fell asleep with the paper in the bed with me, and woke having not drooled on it around noon-ish. After that, Anna called, and I talked to her for a little bit about some anxiety-related issues, and she asked about my dad. I was glad I got the call... I miss hearing from her.

Around five, Justin showed up for the big plans of the day. Christmas is coming, and unless a certain freelance writing project comes through in the month of December, the holiday is likely to be very sparse... so I've decided to try my hand at eBay, and attempt to sell a lot of Swamp Thing and Dr. Strange comics, along with a few assorted collectibles that I felt I no longer needed. Not having a place for these things makes you far less attached to some objects, come to find out. And in all seriousness, I was never all that interested in 'Swamp Thing' anyway.

Most people have missed the point for me doing this -- the unlikelihood of success aside, I'm pinning the whole of my hopes for buying Christmas presents on selling these comics, which usually leads people to look at me like I'm an idiot, and tell me to keep my money for myself. And while I certainly understand that some people might not "get it," Christmas is a special holiday for me, and giving my friends and family gifts is one of the reasons. And all told, I don't think I could handle losing Christmas to this shit storm of bad luck... so this is me doing the only thing I can to try and save it. Selfishly, I suppose.

It took far longer to organize and photograph the things than I figured, but with Justin's help, it was easy enough. Afterwards we hit the IHOP, where the waitress who is way too friendly with us offered to pay me to try and fix a glitched Final Fantasy 7 game. I couldn't bring myself to do it, just because knowing my luck I'd say yes, and then not get back in to the restaurant for six-to-ten months, or something equally ridiculous.

We hit Wal-Mart after, where I saw Chris Jericho's book in paperback, and wished I'd had my food money to buy it instead. Never let anyone tell you that six dollars isn't a versatile amount of money.

Eventually, we rounded off to Justin's house, where we watched Ally's "Always Sunny in Philadelphia" DVDs and the episodes of "The A*Team" Justin has burned, and just generally wasted some time, and hung out. I think Justin appreciated the break on the comic [Re: Calamity Cash and the Town with No Name], and it was nice to see how the pages he was working on looked physically on paper. Some of the layouts he's doing are really amazing -- and again when faced with a situation where my scripting is negligent, he manages to draw something that embodies exactly what I was going for.

We didn't really sleep [Sorry Laura, I lied about getting six hours in there -- you just looked so concerned when I said I'd been up for 24 straight, I felt like I needed to cover], but had cardboard pizzas while I put back the single biggest cup of coffee I've had domestically. By that time, I was starting to feel a little sick again, especially considering my meals over the past few days have almost all included some type of hamburger.

At two we went to Staples in Cross Lanes to meet Laura on her lunch break, and used 'imminent domain' to claim empty seats in a Fazoli's across the way. Strangely, while we were sitting there, just talking, the Gin Blossoms' "Found Out About You" started playing, like it was fucking scored for the conversation we were having, and all Laura could do was laugh at me. I will admit, it unnerved me more than a little -- it's no wonder I'm superstitious. But it was also one of those little things... I may look back eventually and say that it was kind of cool. I like seeing Pixie, though I wish the circumstances had been better, but that is neither here nor there. We dropped her back off at work, and Justin and I headed out to grab him some art supplies at Michael's in Dudley Farms, and then we popped in Books-a-million, mostly just because.

Imagine my surprise. The majority of workers at the bookstore, besides our friend Staci, were people I worked with at Borders last winter, and it was nice catching up a little bit, especially with Bambi. Hopefully I will hear more from her soon... like I also got to at least wave hello to Lana, a Mohawk-sporting girl who I thought was insanely cool when I worked with her before, and who now if I saw more often I could probably nurse a pretty hardcore crush on. Of course, I'm almost 100% sure I'm not her type.

Eventually, it was home. My grandma seemed... annoyed, or agitated, though I've no way to prove that, and it was likely just the sensitivity I was feeling from the sleep deprivation. I tried making myself some leftovers for dinner, but I wound up spilling beans everywhere, and I dropped my first piece of cornbread in the the trash. Eventually, I ended up with a bowl of beans that were scorched or burned, or whatever over-heating in a microwave is called, and while eating I found a hair in them, which was absolutely mine, but come on.

If there's even the slightest question of its origin, you wish you just wouldn't have found it in the first place.

Now I'm done, I wrote a little something, and then I did this, and now I really should be sleeping. But here it is almost 3, and I feel far more lucid than I should.