14 mar 2012

so i was headed home and the weather started looking fierce. the radio report said "thunderstorm" but didn't say if it were a warning or a watch. doh! so i was skeedaddling on homewards. i knew i had to hurry because i needed to stop by the grocery. i needed to stop at the grocery because i planned to stop at the grocery. i mean, there was nothing i absolutely had to have. it's not like we would have starved without that loaf of bread and pint of strawberries. but i had planned to do it so i had to do it.

(remember when i was talking the other day about bringing my work home? seems that's happening in more ways than one. there's a ginormous project climbing steadily to completion, in the final weeks after over a year of work. it's exciting, but it does seem to be taking all my excess brain capacity and encroaching a bit into the non-excessive.)

so. i had to stop. and, i had to have strawberries.

have you ever felt compelled to do something that would be perfectly normal under normal circumstances but which when burdened with the compulsion to complete the task and exacerbated by a pressing deadline (impending storm) becomes absurd? i had to have strawberries. i could not go home without them so i had to stop at the store. i could not leave the store without them so i had to find a satisfactory pint. i scoured the display for a pint that was perfect. oh, here we go now, another layer. i couldn't accept any imperfection in a pint of strawberries that i didn't need but had to have immediatelyrightnow.

lucky for me, i found an acceptable pint, managed to get the rest of the groceries on my list without bogging down in the perfection-loop, and made it home before the storm hit.

(it rained like 4 minutes. the deck didn't even get totally wet.)