Yesterday was a suck-suck-sucky day. The kind of day that you want to quit and start over by noon, but you can't, because you have places to be and things to do. By 1 p.m., my angst was manifesting as actual physical pain, a whole-body feeling of yuckiness. I almost called in sick and went back to bed, but didn't believe that the tortoise routine was ultimately going to be an effective coping mechanism. Most of the suckiness was self-inflicted, exacerbated by perfectionism, self-recrimination, and other dysfunctional thought patterns. I recognized this at the time, but when I've got physical, external, and psychological factors wrecking havoc on my emotions, it's really hard to pull out of the tailspin.

I started motivating myself to just put one foot in front of the other until 6 p.m., when I had a therapy appointment and my therapist could throw me a rope that I could use to pull myself out of the sinkhole hellpit of a day I was having. But then she called in sick! Who gave her the right to get sick?!?!

Okay, okay, okay, I told myself. I'll just have to call one of the People Who Care About Me, who will listen to me bumble through this junk for free. I started running through my mental rolodex of friends and loved ones who could offer the sympathy and sounding board that I needed. But first, I'll go to WalMart. (Yes, WalMart is evil. I still shop there, but I feel appropriately guilty about it.)

I wandered around the low-cost wonderland for about a half hour, mostly not finding the things I was looking for. Then I encountered the massive Halloween candy display. SUGAR!!!!!!! So much for my resolutions about good nutrition; this was a day that definitely called for candy.

I had probably ingested several weeks' worth of my RDA of simple carbs before I got out of the parking lot.

I went thence to the funky food store and bought wheat germ and flax seeds to assuage my nutritional conscience. And I came home and made a good dinner of chicken and vegetables. Everything in moderation, even sugar binges.

Early to bed, and early to rise ... It's a new day; pray it's better than the last one.