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i am having some house buying anxieties, but nothing too debilitating. talking with klea on my subway ride back home, i suddenly realized that after i buy my condo, i will have no money to spend. this truth was reinforced by the fact that last night i wrote out my hypothetical monthly budget once i move out. hypothetical monthly budget says i will actual owe more money than i earn. of course this being me, there is a little bit of drama to all this. i can probably adjust the amount of money i put into my 401k plan (at the expense of when i am old and grey i won't have any spending money - but at least i'll have a house that i won't be able to afford the taxes on). and if our much discussed retroactive raises ever manifest themselves, whatever amount the company can spare will definitely help me out, like i won't have to eat every other day, or light my apartment with candles, or pick my home furnishings from my neighbors' trash.

it's starting to become a bad week for me. the week is starting to sour and curdle. trust me, you don't want any part of this week. besides mortgage stress, i also have gold candidate debugging to do for a friday delivery. if nothing else, at least i have tonight to get a good night's rest. oh - no i don't! because i have to wake up bright and early tomorrow to meet another mortgage broker at the harvard square au bon pain to talk m-o-r-t-g-a-g-e! it's okay, at least i have my weekend, and a long weekend at that. at least i think i do. either destroy myself now so my weekend will be spared, or spill some destruction on poor innocent fin de semana. i rather make the sacrifice now. it could end up going badly both ways, but i'm going to stay upbeat, positive, optimistic, focused. like i said, all this mortgage stress has really helped me to work a lot better. if you can believe that. sometimes i think i work on bizarro logic.

today joanna, the new office manager, started working. rose brought her upstairs briefly, where she was introduced to everyone. i didn't go downstairs until the end of the day, but they completely changed the front half of the office space, swallowing up my old work area by the window and expanding the office manager's space outwards. when i saw the change it was like seeing an old home being demolished. i miss the old office manager though. no more sarcastic timesheet notice on fridays, no more pestering her for so-and-so discs, no more threats of my delivered packages being purposely opened without my permission. today the office seemed different somehow. i'm sure over time we will all come to love joanne the new office manager (her arrival inspired me to download that sweet 80's hit "joanne i love you" from audio galaxy). but this whole upstairs downstairs thing, it's hard to get to know the new people downstairs, and likewise downstairs people have a hard time getting to know new upstairs people. splintered. schismed. divided. i think a lovely company wide outing is in order. and organizers, please be creative and don't package the social event around alcohol. i mean, i love alcohol as much as the next person who's never touched a drop of the stuff in his life, but certainly there must be something else people can do that doesn't involve drinking.

during my lunch break i went down to cambridgeport savings bank to apply for a mortgage there. after being $300 poorer (appraisal fee for the condo inspection) and disclosing every single detail of my financial assets, i went back to the office, starry eyed, grabbing a bagel breakfast sandwich and a cup of coffee from dunkin' donuts before getting on the subway. this whole mortgage business completely changes my perspective of how i see the world. you talk about altering your senses of reality! on the train i'm sizing everyone up, "she rents, he owns, he rents, she owns," and i think to myself, "oh, if only they knew what i was just doing!" their lives seem so simple as my own life takes a complex turn. large sums of numbers dance around in my head. the mortgage consultant at the bank asked me, "boy, it must be pretty exciting, huh? buy a house for the first time," she said. "yeah, sometimes...and then there are times when i feel nauseous," i replied.

after work i went running with alex "i run 16 miles for fun" mcguire. though we each tried to invite other people, because we are so much despised in the office, nobody wanted to come out with us. that was unfortunate, for it was a gorgeous spring day in new england, with temperatures peaking the 70's despite some patches of grey skies and the threat of possible rain. alex had heard much about my running prowess, especially since i run so often, and being a runner himself, thought he'd found the perfect running companion. the stories about my speed have been greatly exaggerated. not sure how it got started, but the more i deny it, the more people think i'm just being modest. i am big ass slow, ladies and gentlemen. however you spin it, big ass slow is big ass slow. and today alex would find out the truth for himself. so we headed out, and earlier he'd been talking about spandex this and that, and i thought that was what he was going to wear, so i was a little bit disappointed that he wore something more traditional. we also joked about how he brought his mesh half shirt ("mesh" is like my recurrent joke theme), and how i was going to wear my "born in the US of A" bandanna with a pair of cutoff denim shorts. we ran at a pretty good pace but once we crossed the mass ave bridge i could feel my body dragging. i lessened my pace and went into silent mode because i wouldn't have been able to talk anyway. finally at the base of the longfellow bridge did we stop and walk back to the office. there's no denying it - the undisputed fastest runner in the office is by far alex mcguire, thus proclaims me, tony "i run only 3 miles for fun" yang! it was kind of funny the things we talked about during the run, and how he was very sensitive to the fact that anything he said might be incriminatingly published on the weblog. i had to assure him that i usually get people's consent (though not always!) before i quote them or defame them somehow. i guess the fact that we talked a lot about the ladies might've something to do with his reluctance to completely confide in me. the running season is long, my friend, you still got time! i guess it's the fact that he's downstairs all day surrounded by foxes that makes him yearn for a male voice to sound off to. of course this is completely speculation on my part, armchair psychologist!

by the time i got back home, i had already missed 10 critical minutes of gilmore girls. rory and jess? she picks the closet-literate rebel over dean, the clean-cut tall boyfriend. i like how she thinks! i wonder how it's all going to play out.