ain't no cure for the summertime blues

I’ve reached the doldrums. I’m slumping. I’m tired of not knowing what day it is and not knowing when my next day off will be. I feel alienated from the world and from many of my co-workers. The XP is down again as we head into another “crunch” week and our freelancers are fading, as they usually do about this stage of the game. They pick their days and hours, a luxury the full-time staff can’t enjoy. I know I don’t have the worst part in this play but that doesn’t stop me feeling low. I will, however, suppress my most maudlin thoughts here.

I had to tell a young freelancer to stop wearing cologne to work. Rather, I asked him to stop, and hope that he will. Apparently it’s become politically incorrect to let people know their odors are offensive. People were laughing at this teenager behind his back and calling him “stinky boy” but I was apparently the only one who suffered burning sinuses and watery eyes from the fumes. Last year there was a guy who never took showers and no one knew how to tell him he stunk. Last year I was taking physical therapy for a herniated disc and during the last week my therapy overlapped with a woman who wore unbearably strong cologne. I already had to suffer the disgusting aroma of nicotine from my physical therapist so I asked a staff person if they could ask this other client to cool it with the cologne or to at least include in their list of guidelines that people refrain from wearing cologne during treatment. The staff person told me the doctors felt it was invasion of privacy or some such baloney.

I’ve just finished reading “The Bell Jar” and I suppose Sylvia Plath’s musings aren’t conducive to a happy frame of mind. I kept hearing references to Plath and then found out there will soon be a movie about her life starring Gwyneth Paltrow so I thought I’d read Plath’s work before I got the Hollywood version of her life. She apparently suffered from Bipolar Disorder and in the 1950’s the main treatment for depression was shock therapy or lobotomy. What witch doctors psychiatrists were. And may be yet; only now many therapists are mere hucksters for either religion or the drug industry. And don't let me get started about Doctor Phil!