Ah, the randomness of it all

As I am currently lacking the capability to put together a coherent thought, I will go ahead and reflect my state of mind with the handy-dandy, trite yet useful bulleted-list format.

• Assertiveness training: Yesterday I made a phone call! A strategic phone call, preceded by lots of preparation and angst, and followed by much relieved sighing. The phone call cleared up (sorta) a work situation that had been weighing on my mind disproportionately, and set in place a chain of events with which I am (so far) very pleased. The messiness of the situation is still oozing out all over the place, but now I feel more like an active participant than a marionette, and this is contributing in a large way to the upswing of my sense of well-being. Don't get me wrong, I am still using up a certain percentage of my life force holding panic at bay, but now I'm buoyed.
• Also, I slept past 6am today! Perhaps this had to do with my assertive "take back the night" measures of yesterday, perhaps it was due to sheer exhaustion, but whatever it is, I will take any reprieve I can get from the odd partial insomnia that has been relentlessly setting my internal alarm clock for way too early lately.
• Feiertag: I think today must be one of those multiple secret German holidays whose origin and purpose elude me, but which are fun to see happen. As I went out to get a Doener for lunch, scads of oddly-clad students rode by on balloon-bedecked bicycles, and now, outside my office windows, horns and sirens are celebrating... um, something or other. Germans love their holidays.
• Luthers Hochzeit: Speaking of which... this weekend, Wittenberg is getting all gussied up for its city festival: celebrating, yet again, the marriage of Martin Luther to Katharina von Bora, leftover nun, in 1525. Four hundred and eighty years of wedded bliss. I hope, for them, that means "happily ever after" and not "never-ending fiery inferno." :-)
• And speaking of happily ever after... that's a bit of a non-sequitur here, because Germans don't believe in it. German fairy tales end with the oh-so-pragmatic assumption: "Und wenn sie nicht gestorben sind, dann leben sie noch heute." ("And if they haven't died by now... well, then they're still alive.") Inspiring, eh? That, and the little mermaid gets her tongue cut out and turns into sea foam at the end. Sorry, Sebastian.
• That tingly feeling... On another note entirely, my whole head is tingling and has been all day. Almost as through a stylist is washing my hair, except really, I checked and there is no stylist here. Just me. I thought perhaps there was a draft, so I closed the window, but no. The hair on the back of my neck is still standing up, and if the hair on my head weren't too long, it would be doing the same. Maybe there is danger lurking around every corner! Maybe the gremlins in my computer are in cahoots with the ghosts in my office! Aaaahhhh...
• Happy Tuesday, y'all.