I've lost my mind! I'll be back when I find it.

*** Later ***

Okay, I've found it, but it's in bad shape. Despite my best efforts, the best-laid plans of mice and men often go awry, especially mine.

I'll elaborate more a little later.

*** Much Later ***

Okay, so one of my brothers-in-law decided to get drunk last night while celebrating the birthday of his youngest sister's daughter (2-years old). Later, he decided to duke it out with one of his brothers-in-law (another sister's husband). I ended up getting in the middle of it and putting a stop to it. I also ended up cursing each and every other person that was involved.

My hard-headed son (it's like cement), wouldn't quit playing video games after 10 pm, knowing full well that he had to get up this morning at 5 am to get ready for school. I ended up laying into him as well.

Later, my wife called to tell me she was having problems getting her own personal bills paid. It turns out that she didn't tell me EVERYTHING when she told me about her personal finances earlier in the month. Okay, using a little creative financing, I took care of the problem, but I still managed to let my anger flare up again.

While trying to have a meaningful conversation with my wife, my DSL service kept disconnecting, which in turn caused the instant messenger session to disconnect. After more than an hour of that shiitake, I called the tech support for Subictel and laid into the only guy that was there. This shiitake was supposed to have been fixed back on January 11th. Why did it work fine and then go to shiitake after 2 weeks?

I've always been acutely proud of my ability to hold my temper. There are many times when I've been able to stay calm and cool when most people would lose it. When I lose my temper, it usually means certain things have been bubbling below the surface and just waiting for something to ignite the powder keg. In my mind, when I lose it, I become big, green, ugly and mean. Of course, that isn't true, but that's what it feels like.

Everything is back to normal now, but only because I had the common sense to walk in the cold (cold?) night air for about an hour or so. There's no animosity remaining between anyone because I was clear and to the point. Some of them will thank me later. They usually do.

• Today, the 25th of January, is my 25th Wedding Anniversary
• Where Did My Weekend Go?
• 10 Days of Misery
• The Report Of My Demise Has Been Greatly Exaggerated
• There's no place like home!