NASA found snow on Mars.

At least one of my PA’s is about as much of a space nerd as I am and gave an excited, “DUDE!” when he read this, causing me to make him send me the link.

I know fuck-all about the continued collapse of the American financial system and quite possibly society in general, but dude, a robot on Mars found snow! How fucking awesome is that?

Last week: 6 days, somewhere between 75-80 hours (I pretty much lost count).

Today: 13 hours, and lost my boss halfway through the day so I got to pull double-duty for most of the afternoon. Tomorrow: Likely even more ridiculous.

I’m bloody exhausted, but I will say: I’m glad I’ve been WAY too busy to watch the economy implode. I’d probably be a lot more worried about it if I had a better grasp on what in the fuck is going on.

I’d like to preface this by stating that the video I’m linking to was shot when I got home four days into a six day week, when I’d already worked well over 50 hours. This means two things:

1. I don’t look too spectacular in this. My hair in particular is starting to go for its evening frizz-out, and generally the black circles under my eyes aren’t quite that pronounced until the end of the day on Friday.

2. My brain was complete mush when I recorded it, so I couldn’t exactly make it stop when I wanted it to, and I’m also rambling a wee bit.

And now the link, which will open a 5MB, 40 second video in a new window (I need to figure out how to convert to flash without getting a YouTube account): The Network is encouraging me to waste enormous amounts of time.

Oh, and this is the toy I got. It’s pretty damn awesome and relatively idiot-proof. However, it’s not really sleep-deprivation proof, as you can see from the video.

Two quick things since I’m neck deep in trying to get everyone up and running for shooting to start the day after tomorrow:

1. Someone needs to tell these damn kids that National Coming Out Day is October 11th, not September 23rd.

2. And now for a wee game of What’s Wrong With This Screenshot, courtesy of British Airways (click to enlarge):

Usually their fares taunt me. Porbably for the best that I don’t even know how cheap it is now.

Prep is always pretty brutal. Trying to formulate a system to get everyone all the information they need, figuring out exactly what information they actually do need, and even simply trying to get a grip on who the fuck everyone is before we start shooting is a time-consuming and exhausting process.

Adding onto that the increasingly Herculean task of dragging myself to the gym an absolute minimum of 4 days a week to try and keep the weight loss going, and time for damn near anything starts to evaporate.

And of course, only in my world is it a problem that this is all happening as almost every show on television starts to premiere. Sure, I have a terabyte of storage space on the big TiVo, but I want to watch everything noooooooow. And by everything, I mean the 30+ hours of crap I plan to record every single week.

All in all, I just need the days to be longer. As much as the prep process sucks, I like my job. And the working out has left me feeling physically better than I have in a long time. But I need more sleep, and I could really use some more time to myself during the week.

Alas, for now, I’ll just keep rolling along, taking the occasional Saturday off the gym and then deciding to make up for it by doing a gym triathlon on Sunday. And sleeping like a hibernating bear on the weekends.

This amusing headline on the CNN website was pointed out to me by Joel earlier today:

Chaplin generally gets cranky with me when I go back to work after a long layoff. Usually this manifests itself in a couple weeks of him mistaking my arms, legs, and occasionally hair for dinner. The biting is annoying, but I would have preferred it to the stunt he pulled this time.

I should preface this by saying that I have a massive cold and can’t smell anything, otherwise I think I would have noticed this sooner, but: Chaplin spent the last week pissing in my laundry basket.

I realized something was off when I’d gone to clean out his litterbox and found it suspiciously devoid of clumps, but because I couldn’t smell anything, I couldn’t figure out where he actually was pissing instead.

Well, I figured it out this morning when I reached in the hamper to try and find an acceptably clean collared shirt to wear to brunch with my step-uncle (oh come on, I only have a limited selection of nice clothes that actually fit me at the moment).

Even through my clogged sinuses, the smell on the shirt I fished out was unmistakable. After brunching in a different shirt, it took me three hours, three loads of laundry, and most of a giant jug of Nature’s Miracle to get the smell out of…most stuff.

The casualties were a blanket and sheet that were probably in need of replacement anyway, as well as the hamper itself. $60 at Bed Bath and Beyond and an unbelievable amount of annoyance with Chaplin later, I’m back in business. And the new hamper has a lid to prevent future recurrences of this delightful incident.

It certainly could have been worse, but I’d also much rather be used as a chew toy. It’s less irritating and significantly less expensive than today’s debacle.

Ah, the first week of work after a long layoff. Inevitable lack of sleep and exposure to fun new germs leaving me sick…again. The good news is that this seems to be one that’s only affecting my chest and sinuses, and not completely addling my brain like the last cold I had.

The bad news: My nose is running like a leaky faucet. Went through half a box of tissues at work, probably going to wind up going through at least a whole one over the weekend. I’ll be a sight to behold in the crowd at Roller Derby tomorrow, clutching a giant wad of tissues as I cheer hot girls beating the everloving crap out of each other.

For now, I’m going to go hang out with my good friend NyQuil. To quote Denis Leary: “NyQuil, NyQuil, NyQuil, we love you, you giant fucking Q!”

Yes, that’s right folks, it took a whopping one day of work for me to come home so tired I lack the energy to do anything except link to something.

Today’s winner: A fascinating analysis of the Facebook/Twitter phenomenon from the New York Times.

I got a job! I start Monday morning, and since the show has a 13 episode order, I’ll be employed for at least a few months this time. I cannot even begin to describe my relief and excitement.

Especially because I will FINALLY have enough hours to qualify for Union insurance and be able to stop coughing up huge chunks of cash for health insurance as of the end of the year.

Ah, the small joys of adulthood.