This morning without meaning to I drove through a no-car zone near a local school. As soon as it happened, I was like, Oh crap, I’m not supposed to be here, but it was too late. I WAS already “here,” both on the planet and in the no-car zone, so I kept going. Naturally, my inner rule-follower felt bad enough, but then one of the recess teachers gave me the evil eye as I made my way back to where I was supposed to be. I thought about it all afternoon. Like, I’M SORRY, MISTER. IT WAS A MISTAKE. PEOPLE MAKE MISTAKES!

Other than being a schoolyard rebel, I spent today painting. Earlier this week I started transforming a turquoise room at a friend’s house into a white room, and today, after over six hours of work, I finished. Here’s the before picture. Well, I’d already primed the ceiling, which was brown.

Here’s the after picture. Look at all that glorious white. I think the space could pass as God’s waiting room. If only the floor were gold. And there were floor-length purple drapes, of course.

This evening, in addition to starting a house-sitting gig, I spent over three hours working on my mom’s tablet. First I helped her sign up for a rewards club (she’s actually done it correctly, but since they didn’t confirm by email, I went ahead and did it again), then I worked getting all her pictures to display properly in her gallery (because they weren’t). For months, certain downloaded photos have shown as black or blank on her tablet, although the files themselves have always been fine. You could move them to another device and view them no problem. Well, everything the internet suggested didn’t work, and it suggested a lot. While going through all the possible solutions, I actually caused more problems. Finally, not only did I fix those, but I fixed the original problem as well. One app had to have its updates REMOVED, and ANOTHER app had to BE updated.

Sheesh. Technology.

By the time this ordeal was over, I was ready to spit nails. Then my dad asked me to change a lightbulb, and I tried three bulbs I found sitting around before one of them worked. In the process, I broke a perfectly good bulb. Shit, I said. It didn’t help that I was hungry.

Things are worse when you’re hungry.

Now it’s 2:15 in the morning, and I’m bound and determined to finish this in 500 words or less and go to bed. Earlier, after working on my mom’s device, I noticed I was in a tizzy. I really wanted to get that problem sorted out, and yet I was hungry, and yet I hadn’t blogged yet. So I got stressed. Finally, after grabbing a burrito (okay, two) and settling down, I took my mind off what was stressful about today and smiled–because I accomplished things. The day didn’t suck. I painted a room, I fixed a tablet. I persevered.