Brought in doughnuts today to celebrate my tenth anniversary at work.

Ten years.

Married here. Honeymooned here. Became a dad here. Twice. Drove through hurricanes and snowstorms to get here and home. Hard to even grasp all the time I spent here, the stories I was part of and the many more I heard about, the people I met, the jobs I worked on, places I went to, things I discovered, about myself, co-workers, management, and the world at large.

The cashier gently cupped her hand under mine while giving me back my change. I try not to ignore subtle bits of kindness like this.

It snowed today. On the first day of spring. I know we can have snows this late, but it's still unsettling on a base level.

The Missus and I have started talking again, tentatively and brimming with barely concealed stress and emotions. It will be a long walk back to where we were.

A rough weekend. In-laws came over to watch The Little Wonder on Saturday and I spent five hours at work trying to get the impossible done.

Sunday became the backlash to a long week for me. I won't go into details, but I felt I presented a danger to myself. Good thing TLW was around.

Emotionally, I'm wiped out. I don't feel anything about work, home life, my wife, my kids, the future, nothing. I want them all around but at the same time they're just projects to be managed, nothing more.

I want to break from this, but I don't know how.

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2:38:38 AM The insomnia has struck again.

Sometimes I can feel myself falling asleep and I think it's my kidneys going on me. As my IGAN progresses, creatinine will build up in my blood. One of the side effects is tiredness. So when I feel myself starting to go, I get up and go do something. I don't always win.

My latest craze: old woodworking machines. Drill presses, saws, jointers of every make and size, style and condition. I've started repairing a few and collecting several more. Although I do want one or two for actual use, most of it is for flipping, hopefully at a small profit.

Side note: whatever happened to America? Before the First Depression, before Social Security, what did we do to make it? Wait for a check? Bitch about the government? If I lost everything (house, car, job) tomorrow, would I be the only one to pick up a hammer and saw and just start over?

I know I sound like some uber conservative up there, but I really do miss seeing the grit and determination of people down on their luck. What gives me hope? Seeing some of it still alive.

Knowing I can take an aging and broken National Cash Register machine, hop on a train and in a few hours be in a store that's been fixing them since the time my father was buying penny candy in front of a similar machine just makes me smile.

And why start up the blog again? Well Facebook is great and all, but I kind of miss the mystery in my life: what happened to friends and old flames, diligently trying to hunt them down. And the mystery of blogging: whose reading this and why. Facebook is so instantaneous that I think I'm suffering from information bloat.

Postings will be sporadic at best and more likely in this stream of consciousness format. Hope you'll stay tuned.