Much like exercise, I’m beginning to get to that point where if I don’t write every day I start to feel like something is missing.  Even a simple little blog post can scratch that itch.

So – what’s up in Anthony-land?  Anthonyville?  Anthonytropolis?  Not much, and yet everything.  I had a birthday yesterday – if you haven’t yet sent in your present, SHAME ON YOU , and it was very nice.  Parts of the day were extra special, and – I’ll leave it at that.  I also got 10 hours of sleep last night, which helped make the day nice on a couple different levels.  Oh my god, here I go again with the cryptic narrative.  I just can’t spill my guts out all over the page EVERY DAY or pretty soon you’d go back to reading Scoble or Pavlina or god knows who else, out of sheer disgust.

I had a good day.  I’ll stop there.  But let me repeat: it was good.  That’s unusual, and welcome.  I want to bottle it and apply it in short bursts throughout the week.

I’ve been working yesterday afternoon and this morning on a side project that involves digging through level after level of superfluous complexity that puts everything else I’ve ever seen to shame.  I saw a Coen Brothers film recently, a bad one, called “A Serious Man”, and one of the characters is developing a mathematical probability theory in a book he calls The Mentaculus.  The book is really just page after page of scribbled numbers in various patterns – lists, columns, whirls, vortices, spirals.  To look at it is to immediately wish one were taking hallucinogenic drugs, in hopes of discovering The Secret To The Universe.  Anyway, this code I’m looking at reminds me of The Mentaculus.  I’m imagining the guy who wrote it wears an Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat and wears two pairs of glasses at a time, just in case. I only have the benefit of two dry cappuccinos to help me navigate the waters.  I’m slowly going insane.

I’m looking forward to working more tonight and this weekend.  Now that I’ve half-cracked the code, I can start to feel productive and hopefully get in that flow state.  I may take some time Saturday morning to go on a long bike ride, if it’s not too rainy.  I have a couple destinations in mind, and will have to make some plans before I go to bed on Friday.  Can I do 50 miles this weekend?  Why not?  I can do anything.

Everything else?  What’s the French word for shit?  Merde?  Yeah, that.  So I’m focusing on what’s good, what I can control, and what I can revel in, take delight in, and what I can do for others.  The secret to  happiness is not absence of merde; it’s accepting the notion that despite the merde, there are still areas of your life that are good; friendships that make you happy; circumstances that one can appreciate; needs of others that you can fill.

So I’m working on it.  Wish me luck.   Hope you’re having a great day!

David Denby, perhaps the preeminent film critic of our time (although I love Anthony Lane also), reviewed the Coen brothers’ new film A Serious Man in a recent New Yorker and wrote:

The Coen brothers in the black, bleak, belittling mode, and, except for a few moments, it’s hell to sit through […] As a work of film craftsmanship, the movie is fascinating; in every other way it’s insufferable.

I wish I’d read his review before I shelled out the $10 to see the movie, because my review was right in line with his. On the other hand, a night out at the movies is a treat no matter what the outcome.

I had a great day today.  Let me repeat that – I had a great day today.  It feels good to write that.  Did I win the lottery?  No.  The day started off wonderfully, and an accumulation of small things afterward kept the momentum going.

Let me begin by relating what I did last night.  I decided to follow up last week’s fun movie experience seeing Whip It with a trip to the Majestic Bay to see the new Coen brothers film, A Serious Man.  As Theodor Geisel might have stated, I did not like it – I did not like it one bit.  It was maybe my least-favorite Coen Brothers film ever (edging out Barton Fink, or maybe The Man Who Wasn’t There).  The storyline revolved around a professor whose life is falling apart around him, and he can’t find any answers to right the ship.  He’s trapped by his own passivity. He gets pushed around by his wife, her lover, his kids, his neighbor, random bill collectors, the rabbis that he goes to for assistance – it’s a real downer.  There are a few moments of Coen brothers signature levity-in-the-midst-of-ruin, but they appear like leaves in a fall windstorm – unsurprising, dry, quickly blown away in the maelstrom.

Earlier in the evening I visited a friend who owns and runs a pizza place and caught up for a few minutes.  If you’re in Ballard and looking for a good pie, try Soprano’s Pizza & Pasta.  It was hopping in there last night, which is always a good sign – it means other people are feeling positive about the place.  It’s got a busy, bustling atmosphere.  The Meat Lover’s pizza was chock full of … meaty goodness.  Yum!

Then this morning arrived. I was up early and able to catch up over coffee with a dear friend who I hadn’t seen in a while.   Good company and good conversation make the time really fly.  It really set the tone for the rest of the day.

Then to an auto shop in Kirkland to get some minor work done on the Land Rover.  Then a drive through the hardest rain of the season so far, back to Seattle to watch the kids play soccer.  Mercifully, we only saw intermittent rain during the game and not the pouring deluge that drowned the Eastside earlier in the morning.  Will scored three goals, all long breakaways, and Audrey, being the nice girl that she is, kicked one into our own goal to give the opposing team some hope.  One can only scream “Other way, Audrey!” so loud/so often.

Then what?  Wow, a nap for a couple hours.  Nice.  The kids woke me up, and we all bundled up and went to the hardware store to pick up some supplies, then on to Serendipity for a quick dinner.  Then back home, where I did some handyman-type work (tiling, electrical, various jobs that required epoxy) for a couple hours.  Meanwhile, the kids piled every pillow in the house under one of their raised beds and jumped off again and again.

Then, Day 90 of my exercise program.  Since Janet’s been out all day with a girlfriend, I wasn’t able to go to the gym or head out by myself for a run or anything, but I did a home workout with the medicine ball and really hit the abs hard.  I’m liking what I’m seeing so much that I took some more “after” pictures with my iPhone with the abdominal setting on the camera set to “rippling”. (lol). Can I just say again how much I love how I feel physically, both when I work out as well as during the rest of the day?  I wore a shirt today that had never before fit me.  None of my jeans fit.  I feel energetic, athletic, strong, powerful, confident, enduring, and relaxed.  Well, for the most part I feel relaxed – it’s not all wine and roses right now.  Heck, it’s not even Snapple and dandelions most of the time.  But when I exercise, everything gets better.

Now the kids are calming down, watching Samurai Jack – an excellent cartoon series.  Did you know it’s won four Emmy Awards?  Me?  I’m dinking around on the internet, cleaning up e-mail,doing a little scheming and planning and chin-in-hand scenario analysis and hoping against hope that I’ll have more days like today.  What will tomorrow hold?  Dunno, but for now it doesn’t matter.  Today was good, and I’m milking the feeling.

Sheesh, look at me, I’ve written another novel.  Massive apologies, but if you’ve read this far you probably like me enough that apologies aren’t necessary. Hope you are doing well.