y eso me hace feliz

"Miss Diana?" says Valentina, looking up at me. "Why..."

Oh, boy.

"...Do we have the best coach?"

"Aww," I say. "Now try that one again during strength."

...

I've been doing this magical thing lately called "lying around in my free time and reading." There has not been nearly enough of it.

I use activities as a means of checking out from the world. Reading and otherwise. I say I've got plans, prior engagements, but really I'm just tapping the glass screen periodically and the page turns. I'm sitting at the desk in crisp gray pants with the attendance book and the pencil raised, but really I would rather hide in other words--especially if I've read them before--instead of stringing my own together.

Occasionally I shower just out of boredom, because water is a better means of filling time. I still think while running, but everything feels distant and pleasant and I create this mental heroic narrative for myself. When I started coaching during grad school, I used to tell people that it gave me a new set of problems to worry about, ones that distracted me from the new school setting and all that follows such a situation (and at this particular school, 'twas a unique setting indeed). I dip in and out of the world.

...

Apparently I'm more or less caught up on the songs, though I wouldn't be surprised if I tripped up somewhere along the way.

What did I learn musically this year? That I'm still not inclined to sit down and listen to music as I write and surf about. It can feel like sensory overload. But sometimes, it works.

Also, it would seem that a sudden but strong love of country music has swept the soul of one who used to say, "I like everything, but really just alternative because I sound cooler that way."

#345: Coldplay, "Paradise"
#346: Jo Dee Messina, "I'm Alright"
#347: Keith Urban, "You Gonna Fly"
#348: fun, "We Are Young"
#349: Noisettes, "Don't Upset the Rhythm"
#350: Cascada, "Pyromania"
#351: Chino y Nacho, "El Poeta" (The rare song that earns an instant download from one D.M.G. Spanish and writing! What more could you want??)
#352: Willow Smith ft. Nicki Minaj, "Fireball"
#353: "Snow Miser & Heat Miser," The Year Without A Santa Claus
#354: Skillet, "Awake and Alive"
#356: Breaking Benjamin, "I Will Not Bow"
#357: Skillet, "Don't Wake Me"