Uselessness Personified

I couldn't sleep last night. I drifted off to uneasy, bad-dream-filled naps in between bouts of tossing and turning with a feeling of dread and anxiety in my stomach. I'm not even entirely sure why. I am aware that I am worrying about this week's lectures, but that is foolishness because A. they are both only an hour long which is nothing so the time will fly, B. one is on a subject I have already taught this semester and it went well, and C. the other is about a subject that is surely inherent to all of my research (documentary analysis). I have a bunch of other deadlines this week but again, all of this is manageable and shouldn't be freaking me out. For some reason it is. I wonder why some weeks make me immobile with terror and others I'm capable of just powering through. Is foolishness but there seems to be no remedy.

Of course, one remedy might be not to piss away half my day on the internet, yes most certainly. And yet, I am apparently incapable of turning the damn broadband connection off. And so I sit, torn between stomach-turning anxiety about it all, and mindless time wastage. Useless.

Also, I have cooked nothing of interest lately. The lad has decided to try and stop eating so much sugar (which actually is probably a good thing because I think me and my baked goods might have been responsible for him putting on some weight lately and that's not nice for him since he feels bad about it) but that means there's no point in getting all creative in the kitchen because it would basically mean forcing him to eat things that he's really trying hard to avoid and that seems border line abusive! Death by baking. I am yearning for more vanilla fudge myself, but as I have done nothing to deserve treats, I cannot let myself make it.

I suspect I am also fretting about my appointment at the Home Office this week. My temporary visa is about to expire so I'm applying to stay here permanently which I'm perfectly allowed to do and which shouldn't be a problem at all. But for some reason I'm worried that they won't accept that A and I are still a couple and that our 11 year relationship has not been just a ruse to get me into the country. I have passed my 'life in the UK test' and have all the necessary documentation (including a seriously unfortunate passport-sized photo...) so it should all be fine, but there's always just that shred of worry in you which says 'what if they don't accept your application and you have to leave the country forever come December 31 and then you lose your job and all hell breaks loose??!'. I must stop these thoughts...they're giving me a horrible headache.

But, the upside to all this grim introspective ranting is that, once I get through this week, next week is filled largely with only meetings and Christmas parties (one of which is black tie and I now have the cutest Mad-Men vibed dress with which I plan to do the full on 1960s glam thing - elbow length black gloves, pearls and possibly even getting my hair put up) and then I'm off on annual leave until next year. And during the pre-Christmas leave, I will be baking and things will be festive and merry. Roll on the 20th! Ho ho ho.