Big news: I made it to the end of the week. It's Friday. The big production problems from yesterday are resolved. I have been cleared to work on other things again.

So it's seven twenty and I’m writing a bit early, because I have to be in the office by eight to have my 1:1 with Neil, who is one of those kinds of managers who insists on scheduling meetings super early in the morning in an attempt to control and influence and intimidate. He's been my manager for a grand total of four months and my quality of life has correspondingly plummeted.

I wanted to prepare something. I really did. But now the meeting is basically on top of me and I have found that I don’t have much to say. I hate feeling as though I have to justify my existence to him, every time I see him. It drives me crazy. I do a reasonable amount of work. I know it’s his right to understand what I’ve been doing. But having to go to the effort of presenting everything to him is difficult. It just takes a lot of time to record every little thing that we do and to communicate it to him. He refuses to acknowledge that reporting on the work I do is work in and of itself and potentially takes away from real work I am possibly able to otherwise do.

And his refusal to acknowledge or admit this fact fills me with rage.

Also, once I communicate something to him, he frequently tries to get involved and tell me how to do it, which rubs me the wrong way and really drives me crazy. He is obviously a control freak. I bet his family hates him.

This morning I’m pretty tired. I had either four and a half or five and a half beers last night. Sure, they were spaced out okay so I don’t feel too hung over or anything, but Christ, I am tired. I am going to call the drinking what it was: A mistake.

I hit snooze twice this morning and it was all I could do to not hit it a third time. It helps me to wake up knowing that I have some time to spend at home before I leave. It really does. Because I’m not just waking up thinking gotta make the T, gotta make the T, or whatever, and subsequently stumbling as fast as I can to get things together so I can leave.

I had some pretty bizzarre dreams last night, but the one I remember best is just odd.

Someone is lying on the ground, but with their head propped up, facing forward. This person is blond, a man with a long, thin face and blue eyes. And he makes the decision to lay down by lowering his head directly backward, like the second part of a crunch, the downward part, making his body completely flat, supine against the earth, as though he's laying in a coffin.

The problem is this: Prior to laying down fully, this person presumably didn't see the six inches or so of thick interwoven cabling wire coming out of the ground. The wire is tapered to a point in such a way that when it hits the back of his head it sinks in, like a screwdriver in a peach, his head swallowing it up, the entire head slipping backward. This dude now has his head affixed to flat earth.

I’m horrified. At this point I’m an active participant in the dream. I look at this guy’s face – his skin has become blotchy and his eyes are sort of rolling around, unfocused. I’m thinking don’t move him don’t move him don’t move him and trying to remember what to do in emergency situations and then I see my hands come around on both sides of his head, pushing into his temples as though I’m catching him in a vice, and I pull up, up and off. I can feel his head sliding off of the wire.

There’s resistance at the end, so I pull harder. I pull harder and harder, and finally give it one final tug. I can almost hear something rip and tear inside. And it’s over. I look at this guy’s face – and he’s not dead – but he’s clearly gone completely insane from the brain damage. There’s nothing left to do, so I wake up.

My sister Jenna is coming over today. I think she’s kind of depressed or something. She has an entire day off and she thinks that it’s worthwhile to come out to Marlborough to see me. Seems silly to me. On the other hand, she will be able to use the pool, which she’s keen on doing, and maybe the gym, you know, that sort of thing.

Here is something my sister will not understand: How someone like me, with a decent job and some money, can be so wretchedly lost.

I have to hide the beer bottles before she shows up.

Wish me luck with Neil.