Being held hostage today by Airborne Express. Delivery guy driving around out there somewhere, already over an hour past their freakin’ guaranteed delivery time. Already missed getting any natural sunlight today. Gets dark too early anyway. Can’t shower, can’t take a shit, can’t go the store for fear I’ll miss the 10 second window of opportunity during which the delivery person rings the doorbell and waits for a response. Maybe I won’t take a shower today. Maybe I’ll test whether Mitchum really is so effective I could skip a day. Any time I hear what sounds like a truck driving by I look out the window to see if it’s Airborne. But it’s only a school bus or a UPS truck. Hear a car door slam, look out window, see nothing but cars, wonder what made me think the delivery truck driver would slam a door. Too much noise outside anyway for this kind of thing, this kind of anxiety-driven analysis of noises. I wanted to do a great many things today, but for the prisoner thing. This is a hostage situation. I shall sue. I called the company, but what’s the use of requesting a refund? I’d get about $5 back. To put a value of $25/hour on the time spent requesting that refund makes it a losing endeavor. I used to place no value on my time. In a lot of ways I still place no value on my time. But in the past I’d spend hours, full days pursuing things worth pennies on the hour. I think some would find it distasteful placing a dollar amount on one’s personal time. The practice has its limitations. It’s intended for things like this. Sitting here, waiting for Airborne Express, waiting for something to happen, some service or necessary event. No matter how many times you look out the window at a time like this, you never see the delivery truck arrive. It sneaks in, silently, and the ringing doorbell comes as a shock.