things that are making my suppressed rage threaten to boil over:

1) they stole my goddamn motherfucking plant off of my front porch, not fifteen feet from my sleeping head. we are light sleepers, and neither of us can believe that we did not wake up when they, the insidious "they" decided they wanted my sick, scraggly ficus that i had put outside for a few days to see if i could revive it enough to justify repotting it. so i walked around the neighborhood, looking to see if i could spot my plant in a strangers yard or on their porch so i could deliver my version of swift retribution (ie-calling my sister while staring at my plant(if it were indoors) and talk about how great it would be if i had the balls to throw a rock through their window and make off with what was mine anyway, or(!), if my plant were outside, simply walking up and running away with it, which would be sort of hard to do no matter what because it's a pretty big plant, not easily movable, which just makes me even more upset, because, like i said, one of us should have heard something.). of course i didn't see my plant, although i know where some people who like to kick dogs for fun live and it's probably them. also, walking around, i saw meriad other things on other people's porches that were way cooler and more easily takable than my sickly plant. grr...

2)the overwhelming smell that is the potpourri of the public building that i work in is absolutely over the top today: a mixture of rotten milk, halitosis, BO, insincerity, and the notorious 'waft and walk.'

3) cramps. blindsided by my womanhood, i always forget how bad it can make me want to rip someone else's hair out by the roots and then make them eat it.

4) who(m)ever is stealing our mail. i will find you, one day it will happen, and we will lock eyes and you will run to escape my wrath, but all that will happen is you will run into the path of an oncoming bakery truck and have both of your legs broken in the accident, and also your neck, and you will pay mightily for your sins against me as a postal customer. asshole.

inventory of foot locker underneath the television set in the bedroom:

animals, stuffed and ancient; with wind-up musicbox bodies that play sad lullabies that used to make me weep inconsolably when my mom would put me down for a nap: 2

teeth, puppy; from my dog jake-the ones i could snatch before he swallowed them and the one i found in his water dish: 3

yearbooks, highschool; in which my dorky photos will remain buried: 4

diploma, highschool; emblazoned with an otter wearing a graduation cap: 1

journal, leatherbound; stolen from some store in Minneapolis when i went through my post-adolescent klepto phase and still haven't had the heart to use, really: 1

coins, old baggie of; also containing an estee lauder solid perfume case shaped like a miniature handbag that belonged to my grandmother and that i keep thinking will eventually be worth a lot of money someday: 1

bank, piggy; stainless steel, filled with the "new" quarters my exhusband started collecting and a wad of crumpled $2 bills: 1

seed beads, boxes full of hideous: 3

sheet music, pilfered; from my high school choir room, lining my dream of becoming the choir's accompanist: 35

letters, envelopes of; from friends and boyfriends, kept because i thought i would need them someday to "remind me of the time when i used to have friends" (ugh!): 10

childhood, plastic horses from my: 0 (where did they all go? do you know how much money those things are worth now?)

negatives, ring binder of; mostly taken in my graphics design class in tenth grade, real quality work: 1

album, photo; containing like, 8 rolls of wedding pictures, kept in this box because what kind of person keeps wedding photos from a failed marriage within easy reach, and conversely, what kind of person throws away wedding photos of any kind? i mean, i have photos of my parents' wedding and i even like to look at them. they seem so happy and ignorant of what the next 25 years will bring: 1

photos, incriminating; where my nosering is clearly visible, back when i insisted on wearing one of those huge rings. my mom would still probably bust a lung over most of them as she's not a fan of facial piercings: 4

hair, dyed-black braid of; kept from the first time i ever cut my hair above my shoulders, a traumatic experience: 1

wisemen, plastic chinese; stolen from a garage sale, and jesus, you'd think someone would have caught me taking some of this stuff, i mean, i wasn't good at it or anything: 3

top, wooden; origin unknown: 1

journal, trip; blue and fuzzy, recording everything about my trip to hawaii with my husband and his parents except for the fact that i thought i was pregnant and therefore wouldn't let him take a helicopter ride over one of the volcano craters because it cost something like $200 and i figured we'd need all the money we had for, you know, dealing with the baby or whatever, and then getting my period in the middle of the night in our sweltering motel room where we were sleeping on the couch because his older sister and her husband called dibs on the bedroom and so i woke up with disabling cramps lying in a pool of my own blood and my husband took the bloodied sheets and my pajamas and washed them while i sweated and moaned on the deck and watched the roaches climb around on the railing, and you know i don't think i ever really said thank you to him for that moment of kindness: 1