Let me explain to you something about the past few days:

For the past several months, I’ve been feeling very rushed, very stressed. This is partially because I took more onto my plate than I’d ever had before, and I felt a bit overwhelmed. Finally, after easily six months, things have started to fall away as “done.” The past two weeks I started to feel a bit more like I was in control of my life again.

The downside of this is that the feeling is starting to have lasting effects, namely killing my motivation but good. Today, I sat around reading manga online until 3 in the afternoon, before finally showering off (and I’d felt the need for it since the previous night). Mickey and I then got up and picked up some boxes to pack some of our more moisture sensitive materials in (like books). While out and about (not in a boat), we got a call from my parents, who wanted to see my blue hair. So we went to dinner with them, over at Lui Lui’s…

Which gets us to the red dress mentioned in the title of this entry. There was a tent sale, you see, in the parking lot of the restaurant, which we meandered through after eating. Mickey managed to find a really nifty red dress that she really likes (and is now wearing), for about 50% off. There is a certain humor to seeing my wife (whom I am constantly looking toward to get permission to spend money) reverse the roles and look at me for the approving nod on the purchase.

Eli had an interesting comment this evening, as we sat around doing our nightly blog entries (SUCH A GOOD THING!!!). “I don’t really have a readership per se, so my blog entries really just serves to show to random viewers that I am, indeed, a freak.” This is a really remarkably astute comment for most blogs. It’s not that we have much of a readership other than ourselves and our friends. It’s that it records in a semi-permanent medium a sliver of who we are at a given moment, gives a brief glimpse as to who we are.

This ties into my EXCEL essay about online communities and personas. We create a sense of identity through our actions online, and by talking about our personal lives we incorporate a part of our real life into our online identity. Do it enough and the two blend together, to create a balanced person in both the real world and the online world.

It’s a good thing, dammit!