Getting up for work or class, optional? Writing Web surveys at 3 a.m. instead of studying for an exam? Skipping class to lie out on the lawn when it's beautiful outside? I remember that, vaguely.

My tasks this afternoon involve copying badly written financial terms and pasting them into an HTML glossary. It's pretty outside, but I'm editing definitions for Profit Before Taxes & Extraordinary Items. What has my life become?

My weekend was nice and boring. I worked on my freelance article, got a massage, went to an Oscar party (and won $70 in the pool, whoo hoo!). The weekend kicked off with a little tiff, though. A. got mad at me because I was indulging in my little bad habit (picking at the skin around my fingernails) and, while in Blockbuster, made myself bleed.

Now I'm the first to admit that I have major issues. I went to see a neurologist about my headaches on Thursday, and he took one look at me and said "You're the high-strung type, aren't you?" I am, I am. I can't remember when I wasn't. I've always had bad nervous habits, from biting my nails to twisting my hair. It could be because I'm a Type A personality, or it could be leftover from growing up a nervous child (lying in bed every Wednesday night, my mom's bowling nights, wondering if she was going to come home or leave us once and for all probably didn't help much). It's so hard to tell. But whatever it is, it's probably the source of my headaches and the occasional defensiveness and emotional outbursts I try so hard to overcome.

A. got really pissed and didn't speak to me much throughout dinner, which of course made everything worse. I didn't know why he was mad, thought it was because I'd taken him out for Japanese and he wanted something different. So I start my paranoid pleading that I do in situations when I think I've made somebody unhappy:

"Do you want to leave?"

"No."

"Is this OK with you?"

"Yes."

"We can go someplace else. Thai? Chinese?"

"No."

"Why are you mad?"

"I'm not."

So we just sat in silence for a bit.

Later, in the grocery store, we broke the silence and addressed the issue. He doesn't understand what's bothering myself so much that I could constantly be working away at layers of skin. And he has a point. "It's like golden retrievers and hotspots," he said.

Yes, that too.

So we made up and I made a concerted effort not to do that thing I do, but it's hard. I find it strangely comforting, and I don't like having to be conscious of it all the time.