this week so far (starting from monday) i've worked 66 hours. i'm actually a little bit disappointed with those numbers, i was hoping i'd hit 80 hours. 80 hours would mean i'd have to work 16 hours a day. that leaves 8 hours left for everything else, which includes commuting time (for me, 2 hours rountrip), eating, and sleeping. no way would i have been able to pull that off. after deducting the hours for commuting, that leaves 6 hours per day for sleep and eating. i think 66 hours is probably the maximum amount of hours i can physically endure without completely self-destructing. that means a little over 13 hours of work per day, with say about 10 hours for other activities, 8 hours after deducting travel time to and from the office.

i'm just obsessed with numbers.

what kind of toll does working so many hours take on the body? i probably have bags underneath my eyes. i've been wearing glasses a lot these past few days, so it's probably hard to see. i think mentally, it's caused some trauma. on my recent nyc trip, i could sleep saturday night and i kept having these semi-waking nightmares about the code. that's how i knew i was at the breaking point. when you start having nightmares about the work, it means finally the stress has seeped into your unconsciousness. i'm actually surprised it took so long to finally happen. also, i find myself involuntarily wincing occasionally when i lapse into a little mini-coma thinking about any numbers of the particularly stressful part of the programming.

tonight will be good. tonight i will get my first decent night of sleep in a long time. i wasn't able to do that last weekend because i went to nyc. thinking about that makes me wince.

i woke up at 5am to take the motorcycle out and ride to the office. if you can wake up that early in morning to ride and the weather's warm enough, it's a great feeling. the streets were completely empty. there were a lot of times when i stopped at street lights and thought to myself, hey, maybe i should just go. there's nobody around anyway... i also rode zigzag on these empty roads, weaving back and forth between the empty lanes. on the road occasionally i'd feel things hit my face, which i figured were either flying bugs or pebbles kicked up by the tires. when i arrived at the office and looked at my face in the mirror, i knew it was probably bugs because on my cheek i saw some residual bug guts and a single bug leg. gross. fortunately i learned from that time i swallowed a bug to always ride with my mouth closed.

at the office my grass is starting to grow and i've taken it out of the ziploc bag and moved it to the windowsill. the last time i had grass growing in the office was at the end of march. i guess during the summer season there's less of an incentive to grow grass indoors, since if you wanted to see grass, you can just go outside and take a look. during the early days of spring however, with the ground just thawing from another new england winter, good green grass is hard to come by. anyway, by the end of next week i should have a little lawn again. stay tuned.

besides the programming hell that i was in (once again, another deadline will not be met) that put me in an unfun mood throughout the day, the other office excitement was the drawing for the vacation lottery. in order to raise money for dan and ed's triathlon competition, we had an office lottery where the prize for a $20 ticket was one paid vacation day, donated by the company. in order to be fair, no one who bought a ticket was allowed to draw the winning name. the final system that was used was to have amy and laurie pick the name. amy picked two names, and laurie picked from those two, to get the name of the final winner, which was liz. hey, i didn't want an extra vacation day anyway, i'd rather be at work, hanging out with all my fellow coworkers! i heard they raised over $800 for the triathlon (the money is actually going to some AIDS charity).

after work i got a free invitation to a red sox game from mark hickey. apparently deb's (his wife) company had some spare bleacher seat tickets. i waited for the green line at park street with amanda. i was instantly drawn to this woman wearing red pants. i can't look away now, red pants are utterly fascinating to me. it takes a certain special person to wear red pants, especially for guys. it more socially acceptable for women to do it, but for a guy to successfully pull it off, that's something else.

i waited outside the pizzeria uno in kenmore square for about an hour before mark and deb showed up and we walked to fenway park. the sox played the orioles. in the 6th inning, with the orioles in the lead, the sky started flashing with lightning and then it began rain heavily. that wasn't before i was able to have a bag of popcorn and three hot dogs! actually, i was only suppose to have 2 hot dogs, but i bought 2 for mark and deb only to discover that deb doesn't eat hot dogs (she's too high brow for such debased food item), so i ate another one.

rain delay

lansdowne street (green monster)

selling t-shirts "jeter swallows"

crowded kenmore station

with the heavy rains, everyone was crowded into the area beneath the seats. i decided this was my cue to leave, so after bidding my farewells, i was off to a crowded post-game kenmore station. at the entrance to the station there were two men who were able to fight. their friends were bracing them, holding them apart. i thought the crisis was over, but underground in the station, i was standing just a few feet away from the drunk before he punched this other man in the face with his fist. what did i do? i just stood there and watched, a split second idea of taking out the camera to snap a few photos quickly passing through my mind but i thought the better of it. anyone who's witnessed a fight can tell you, it's very anticlimatic, and it goes down pretty quick. the drunk laid down one punch, but when i saw his face, it was he who was bleeding from his mouth. there must've been something else going on that i missed (maybe he hit his face when he slipped down the stairs, something else i had a front row view to, and something else that i did nothing to help, i just quickly walked away, didn't want to make any new friends on a rainy friday night). on climbed onboard a crowded green line train, get to park street, and took the red line to kendall square, where my rain-soaked motorcycle was waiting for me back at the office parking lot.

from the office i rode home my motorcycle in the rain. it wasn't a big deal from a getting wet standpoint, because i was already pretty much soaked from the red sox game. however, this was my first ride in real rain condition. i had two good things going for me though, it was still a warm night, and the rain was sporadic, ranging from light to medium, and eventually just a barely noticeable drizzle. i could hear the raindrops splattering on my helmet and i could feel them hit my face, like pin pricks. occasionally i'd wipe the outside of my goggles with my gloved hand, manual windshield wipers. i actually felt pretty good riding home. i think i actually do better at nights, because there's nothing to distract me, so i sort of ride by sensation alone, sort of like riding blind. whenever i come to a stop next to a car, it's quite the contrast. there they are, safe and dry in their portable cage, and here i am, dangerous and wet on my motorcycle, don't really care that i'm getting drenched, exposed to the elements. it was weird, certain sections of memorial drive next to the charles, i could taste the river when i drove by, the air was so thick with water. when i finally did get home, a relief washed over me as i got out of my wet clothes and to finally have this day (this week!) come to a close.