When the Partnership For A Drug-Free America buys ad time on television, they need to specify that their commercials should not be aired right after other commercials where monkeys pretend bananas are cell phones. Come on, focus up, Partnership. I should not have to tell you this.

So: work is terrible. I am exhausted. I had mad bastard nights in college, like everyone - the peak, I think, was an eighteen hour marathon session to generate 66 pages of largely fictional field observations for a sociology project - but, left to my own devices, I can turn out 2-3 pages per day on a consistent basis with relative peace of mind. Presently, the rabbi demands 8-10 pages per day. My head buzzes when I try to form a sentence in the late afternoon. I'd never felt it before; it's really rather an unpleasant feeling. All around, as I am trying to write, people scream, shriek and squall for reasons largely unknown to me. Their work has nothing to do with mine. They were raised to believe that you are only alive if you are making noise. I have lobbied for a quieter work environment at the least and a lighter work load at the most, and both requests have been repeatedly dismissed. "But you get it done! You always do it!" replies the rabbi. The man is possessed of a sickness. You cannot say that I am not being reasonable. And I have nothing left in me when I go home. I wonder if I'll have anything left when I leave here for good.

As I write this, I can see that the tape machine is spinning; the rabbi is phoning in yet another project, and, according to the counter, it has taken him four and a half minutes thus far to describe it.

Ah, I don't mean to whine, and I mean to keep this webpage current with things of interest, not this sort of thing. But I feel I have to explain myself. This is a strange place, and a sick one.