Dan and I are sharing a small table at St. Elmo’s, a coffee shop that serves Stumptown. I told the barista that I’d lived in Portland for a number of years and she stared at me like I was from outer space. You’d think if you were serving Portland coffee, you’d know it (Stumptown is Portland’s “official” nickname). But that’s neither here nor there. Less expensive than Starbucks and twice as good. They didn’t have a dark roast, so I just got a large and added some espresso shots to it. Depending on where you live, this is either a “red eye,” a “shot in the dark,” or a “wizard jump.” Personally, I picture it as stumbling into a coffee shop with my eyes half open and saying, “just fuck me up.” Although doing that rarely gets me the required results. Lindsay does. My sister is a magical being with coffee. For some reason, everything she orders is perfectly calculated to not quite stop your heart. When I’m with her, I don’t even bother ordering. I just stand next to her and say, “I’ll have what she’s having.” I don’t care what it is. Dragon skin, unicorn blood, nine shots double meth, whatever.

Caffeine is really my only vice, my favorite drug. I will occasionally drink alcohol, but I tend to go weeks without it because I get enough calories from all the crap I eat. I just don’t feel the need to add to them, especially since I go mental when the alcohol kicks in and I am not in complete and total control. Most people don’t feel this until they’ve had a few. I feel it immediately because of my size and lack of tolerance. I’ve also noticed that the sugar rush from even one beer will keep me up for hours, so a “shift beer” literally means “let’s not fall asleep until 0700.” I’m sure for some people, this sounds really fun. For me, not so much. I tend to keep resetting Stitcher, because I think it will take 30 minutes to fall asleep, then it’s “End of Episode,” then it’s 60 minutes, then the sun is up and sleeping through the day is a special kind of hell, especially on the weekends, when there are generally contractors working on the house when I’m trying to sleep. Nothing like trying to fall asleep to the uneven rhythm of a hammer.

Because I get sometimes very little and mostly uneven sleep, I have so much to do that I am overwhelmed, from laundry to organization to just getting a haircut (I like the one I have now, just need to get it shaped again). On the way home might be my best bet, because I also have to get a few things at the store… and by that I mean pads, because my period tracker application finally has enough data to warn me beforehand. When I got the e-mail, I was all like, “SO THAT’S WHY I ATE HALF A LARGE PAN PIZZA LAST NIGHT!!!” In case you’re wondering, cheese, cheese, more cheese, jalapeños. I’m lucky I still have some left. Really.

All of my rules about eating vegan at home go out the window when I am basically a premenstrual Cookie Monster, except that it’s not just cookies, it is anything and everything within my reach. Today it was a Carolina pulled pork sandwich and a Cheerwine™ If you have never had a Cheerwine, I do not know what you are doing with your life. If you live in a place where they don’t sell them, order off the Internet. They’re that good.

Also a big fan of Maine Root lemon lime soda, because it also has ginger in it. Great for a cold shift drink with no caffeine, because I’ve generally overdone it beforehand. I am extremely proficient in this area. Reminds me of a funny meme I saw on Facebook:

Me: These edibles are shit.

two hours later

Joins search party for myself.

Wait, you mean coffee takes a few minutes to kick in? #mindblown

It’s been about 20 since I finished my red eye, and I am still dragging ass. But, because it’s 1500, I am reticent to order any more, and I have a feeling it wouldn’t help, anyway. I have taken my clonazepam, Zyrtec, Sudafed PE, etc. In order to combat all that, I’d have to have an energy drink as well, where I would end up tired AF and staring at the ceiling most of the night. Right now I just feel like I am up, dressed, and still asleep at the same time. In fact, when I was at the Metro station this morning, I fell asleep while standing up against one of the columns. It was delicious. It was only six minutes, but it was a really good six minutes. I figured I’d wake up when the train came roaring into the station, and I was right, thankfully. I got a good enough cat nap not to trip my way to a seat.

I brought my Kindle on the train, and bailed out of “Trump,” by Bob Woodward, to give my brain a rest from the utter insanity of a world without time travel.

I switched to, unsurprisingly, a time travel novel instead. It’s part of a series. Though it’s not the first book, I got “The Chronothon” by Nathan Van Coops for free from BookBub, and as the months have gone on, some of the others have appeared as well. I just got the latest one from Amazon. I don’t want to tell you much about the series- too many twists and turns to give away that are awesome, but I will say that “The Chronothon” is a set of Olympic type games in which you also have to find your way through time to get to them. It’s the perfect “I’m going to Alexandria” read, because it’s light and fun so that I don’t get so engrossed I miss my stop… although that’s kind of hard, because if I am even remotely paying attention, I know that when we pull into the airport station, it’s time to pack everything up. I am rarely even remotely paying attention. 😛

I tried to get a good picture coming across the Potomac, but it took me a second to get my camera open, and then the lens was facing me. By the time I got all that straightened out, I’d missed my shot completely. Just imagine it was awesome. All DC pictures are. I don’t have to work very hard. Just quickly if I’m on the train. Blink and I miss it.

My next shooting expedition is going to be the new Spy Museum. So happy they’re getting expanded digs, sad that the James Bond exhibit is on its way out. With the Spy Museum, I have this funny image in my head of the museum in “Futurama” where all the heads are in glass jars so you can talk to them and find out how they died, etc. Everything from “trying to save the world” to “tripped on a sidewalk in Kabul.” The latter being me as a spy, of course. I can totally picture talking to the CI, getting the intel I need, and dying on the way back from something totally and completely lame. Like, my nickname would be “George W. died” for all eternity, because W. was almost taken out by a pretzel. At the very least, he never got stuck in a bathtub, though I’m not sure which is more embarrassing. Thoughts?

I would probably put it in my will not to put a star on the wall at Langley for me if the cause of my death was akin to tripping over my own feet.

“She gave her life in service to this country.”
“How?”
“She didn’t see a tree stump that was literally right in front of her and it was the one thing for a hundred miles with a big rock right in front of it.
“Brave. Like, that is seriously Seal Team Six valor right there.”
::uncontrollable laugher::

Which is totally how time travel would come in handy for me, being able to back up ten seconds at will…. except you can’t cross your own timeline.

“Are you sure you can’t let me walk around the tree stump?”
“Fixed point in time. I’m so sorry.”

I just have to hope that on the days I’m most likely to trip, my sister is there to help make me quicker than usual.