Oh, Hell

Ok, so in the span of 24 hours I've gone from being a lazy and procrastinating person, thinking, "Oh, I have all the time in the WORLD to get things done before my trip - two weeks! I can procrastinate for a week, and then I'll take care of business, and then I will be off! Hurrah!" to being a slightly hysterical person going, "Oh my stars! What the hell! How shall I get all of the things done?!?!?!"

You may wonder why there is this dramatic change. Well, in part, this is just the sort of person I am. I am the sort of person who veers wildly between lazy and hysterical. It is also because I learned today that it looks like I will be having a visitor in one week's time, which means that days have been shaved off my previous schedule. Now, don't get me wrong: I want to see this visitor. I have been, in fact, looking forward to solidifying some plans related to this person visiting, and think that this visit will be an excellent idea to pursue. That said, when the plans hadn't really materialized a week or two ago, I just figured that the visit would occur in July. When I was back from my travels. You know, because I follow the whole two-week rule with booking plane tickets. I just assumed that everybody followed that rule. Not so, apparently. But so I had an idea in my head of how such a visit would transpire, but apparently the Visitor had another idea, and so now, here we are.

What does this mean, in concrete terms?

In the next week, I must:

• make an appointment for beautification and go to said appointment (this was going to happen the following week, but want to look beautiful if am having out-of-town guest and also must look beautiful for trip which follows close on the heels of said guest.)
  
• laundry
• household chores like washing the floor, cleaning the bathroom, etc., that one must do when visitors descend.
• grocery shopping.
• Get M-K's nails done.
• procure supplies from the wine store.
• write conference paper (thank GOD! I finished that novel)
• call to have maintenance person come look at A/C as is making strange knocking sound. Also have maintenance person fix drip in kitchen sink.
  
• Make packing list for big trip.
• Clean out car and get car washed.
  

Ok, that doesn't sound like that much when written out - clearly can accomplish all of this in one week's time, right? RIGHT?

There are other factors that are making me wig out a bit, but let's just say that those factors are probably totally outside of my control so I should just focus on the list and let those other things take care of themselves. Because there's nothing I can do about those things. And to think about them just makes me a fool. I know this. Lather, rinse, repeat, as necessary.