The plan was all in place.

Wake up nice and early.
Go to the counselor for my mental health tune-up.
Watch the rest of the last episode of Downton Abbey.
Return the DVD’s.
Review the software product I’ll be using in my next project.

Somewhere in there would be something happy which could be the topic of a blog entry today.

Nice, easy non-schedule. The way it was supposed to go.

But no. That’s not the way my day went.

Last night set the stage. I watched the third season of Downton Abbey till my eyes couldn’t stay open. I think it was one thirty in the morning before I went upstairs, set the alarm and collapsed into bed.

Every other hour or so through the night my eyes popped open. Random thoughts … nature calling … whatever.

I decided to start my day at 5 AM by reading emails while staying in bed until the alarm went off. Somewhere around 6 AM I fell into a deep and restful sleep. Until the phone rang …

… fifteen minutes after the time I was to have been at the counselors office.

The alarm was still set … and was still turned on … but had not gone off.

Great.

Nothing shows how together you are to the counselor more than sleeping through your appointment. 

Immediately calling the office, they said “No problem, you are in luck. He just had a cancellation for 3:15 this afternoon.”

After groveling and apologizing profusely, I accepted the appointment for the afternoon and began my day … again.

Two calls and two favors asked of me later, I decided to watch the last of the Downton Abbey Season Three DVD. What a crummy way to end the season.

We are not amused.

Decided that the happy thing of the day should be me getting my hair done … cut, colored, that sort of thing. After all, the Magic Michelle had just posted her schedule and phone number hadn’t she?

So I called to clarify some things … and great news, she had an open spot at 5 PM.

Well, that should give me time to get my mind healed and get to the new shop she worked at in plenty of time.

Showing up twenty minutes early, I patted myself on the back. She had sounded like she had nothing much scheduled for the day … but that was to be expected at a new shop.

So I walked in to the new upscale shop … and up to the gal behind the desk. The one with the delightful sleeve of tattoos and various piercings.

Me: I’m here for my appointment.
She: With whom?
Me: With Michelle … at five. I know I’m early but …
She: Michelle is not here.
Me: Oh, that’s OK, I can wait till she gets back.
She: No, Michelle is not here. At all.
Me: But I just talked to her a few hours ago.
She: Michelle left here three weeks ago.

At this point her sister-in-law … who had also gone to this new shop … came out to say hi.

“Michelle isn’t here anymore … you must have talked to her at her new place … fifty miles from here.”

Yes, my day was just going splendidly.

Add to that the fact that I cannot find my cute little shiny red Nikon camera used specifically for blog pictures and capturing license plates … and you pretty much have the way this day has gone.

Never being one to give up easily, I came home to make myself a great dinner … pasta … with a sauce made from shrimp and lobster bisque … from the place that makes it like no other.

Got out the bag of frozen shrimp … pre-cooked, deveined, peeled and whatnot … and poured some into a pot of boiling water. Dinner cooked as I chatted on the phone.

Mixing it all together, I discovered the shrimp was pre-cooked, deveined and whatnot … but not peeled.

Which meant every shrimp had to be fished out of the thick sauce and peeled before I could eat it.

Then I settled down with dinner to watch a movie I had gotten a long while back but never watched. I am determined to find a happy thing in here somewhere.

And suddenly my throat began to itch on the inside. Then my ears began to itch on the inside. And I remembered that sometimes … with some kinds of frozen shrimp … they use a food preservative … sodium bisulfate.

Which I am allergic / sensitive to.

Times like this I wish I was a heavy drinker.