Morning manifesto

The following things are bothering me today (today, now, here, at 4:07am):

· Hideous earache in my left ear, the side I sleep on, keeping me awake most of the night and finally driving me out of bed half an hour ago to treat it with peroxide and antibiotic ointment. I seriously thought I had outgrown these. Damnit.
· The need to begin selling my old crap on eBay.com. My fear that no one will want my old crap.
· My nephew-to-be's gender and thus his name-to-be. However, there is to be no criticism of the name, as it is the name of my brother's best friend who died tragically and suddenly at the age of 25. How do you argue with that?
· My cat's apparent early morning fixation upon chewing on electrical plugs, the origin of which I know not.
· My inability to take a decent picture of myself. See top of right column for details.
· Dad's bare ring finger. I hadn't realized he had taken off his wedding ring, and I don't know why it guts me with sadness.
· Hannah's mullet approaching rural Midwestern proportions. Her refusal to wear pigtails.
· My boss buying a house priced three and a half times higher than mine. Sure, her husband is a surgeon, but I didn't think we were in such vastly different social classes.
· My misunderstanding that the antibiotic ointment contained some kind of a topical analgesic, and this preventing me from going back to bed just yet.