The Good Ship Trout Lists, Tries to Right Itself, and Wrongs Itself Instead*

Softball Slut stopped by the other day and asked a question about my nickname for my experience at Amazon.com. Several years ago I read somewhere that the process of naming things is a manifestation of our need to control it; that by assigning a word we assume some sort of psychological power. I believe it (and for now, we'll ignore the problematic nature of semiotics as brought to our attention by Saussure and co.)

So yesterday, in the process of covering some theoretical territory I hadn't crossed in a few months, I realized I also hadn't made a list for quite a while.

You see, readers, a few years ago an Amazonian helped me through a rough time by advising me to make a list of absolutely everything I was worried about. So I'd sit up at night writing single words or phrases on regular sized notebook paper, often making two or three columns to conserve space. In my days at the 'Zon, my lists would often cover two full pages.

After I quit the place I got in the habit of not just listing the things I was worried about but also writing out specific steps I could take to fix them. And eventually I even got to the psychological place where I was comfortable crossing stuff off the list if there was truly nothing I could do.

All of that was a longwinded way of telling you that I'm about to list everything that's bugging me right now (well, almost everything). We'll skip the part about specific action to take since at this point I kind of do that automatically whenever something bothers me. In no particular order:

room smells b/c of shower leak no one seems capable of fixing

• current job
  current camp's behavior sucks
  pay
  handcuffed to campus

friends' wedding invite found in mailroom a month late
wedding gift for other friends

• out of shape and flabby
  little time for exercise
  little motivation – find it!
  shin splints – use bike trainer instead of running
• money, long-term
  smallish salary
  debt
  new car?
  no cable/internet until cc is paid off – where to blog anonymously?
• the move
  organizing help
  packing
  enough room for all my crap?
• new job
  planning
  rules and regs
  too busy to coach?

family's health

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* The first reader to correctly identify the reference to the phrase "Tried to right itself but wronged itself instead" wins a pony.