Still alive...

Though I am sleeping a ridiculous amount, and still don't quite feel rested ever. I am told this is a normal phase in the post-layoff process. I can't wait for it to end.

Strangely enough, I am still consumed with simmering rage. I'm still trying to process this bit of information from my former colleague Mike Miner's blog (which is excellent and you should read it): not only the news of the new offer for the Creative Loafing buzzword-speak dungheap, but the titbit buried in the comments from John Sugg. That Ben Eason's 10%-for-editorial budgeting is significantly below industry standards, whereas of course the original Reader had it significantly above. (As if you can't tell that just by comparing). And that the interest payments on his loans exceeds the editorial budget for all of his papers combined.

I don't know what to do with this information. I don't know who to scream at. I want to write an urgent letter, a telegram, a smoke signal, an owl-delivered Howler written in blood to the President wailing, "Barack, do you realize you are dealing with a whole country full of Ben Easons? People addicted to the grimy, sleazy little thrill of pushing fictional numbers around on paper, to the extent that the actual business or industry they claim to be involved in is irrelevant? And if you had understood this fully, would you still have wanted to be President? Or would you be looking into your options with regard to emigrating to a country where they actually still make real stuff?"

I used to know how to curse people. The knowledge lapsed 'cause I never used it. I just never really wanted to. My anger is usually very short-lived and I'm too disorganized to hold grudges. Now I want to get back "in shape."

It's a wonder I can sleep at all, much less too much.

Now reading: To Reign in Hell by Steven Brust. A retelling of the fall of the rebel angels from a non-judgmental fantasy perspective. I'm not that far in yet, and so far I'm loving his idea of the conflict being largely about order versus chaos and a desperate attempt to for beings of order to survive in a hostile environment (Yaweh originally intends to create Earth as a safe haven). I'm not a huge fan of the sparse, dialogue-driven style - my bias is towards more descriptive, setting-based writing, and I wish I had a better sense of what Brust's fragile, unstable Heaven really looks and feels like. But the story and characters are keeping me loping along anyway.