Okay, I have been dealing with a professionally paranoid, cynical and negative individual for some thirty years. This dude has made a living from thinking of what bad people could do, and then figuring out how to build a defense against that. Suffering from severe depression all of his life may have helped some of that destructive thought-process, but again, this is nothing new.

So tonight I got just a little bit scared when he calls from the grocery store (commissary, to us military types) and is undergoing a panic attack - just simple fear of being surrounded by people. And by the time he got home, he was convinced that 'someone' was outside - asking me, "do you always have the shades part way up? Can they be put down?" and "Why did the porch light just go on?" "There is someone outside, I am certain!"

The only positive aspect of this is that he RECOGNIZES that this is paranoid and abnormal behavior, and he doesn't usually feel like this. And he did agree fairly quickly to taking a sleeping pill and going to bed.

It's probably a good thing that I know his psychiatrist as well as I do - an appointment tomorrow will be made if this is still happening in the morning.

I'm also trying how to work tomorrow. I went up to Benson (about an hour and a half drive) Friday morning REAL early for a two-piano job - went back TODAY since they have a concert tonight, and it needed a touch-up.... and now am expected back TOMORROW for the follow-up on the second piano and since they have a half-day... but I also have to be up in Benson DAY after tomorrow for a counseling appointment!

Gas ain't cheap anymore, my truck doesn't get hybrid mileage, and I am honestly TIRED of making this three hour drive every day. But I also want to keep the business, the customers happy, and the work moving along. So I guess the idea of going out tonight and letting the air out of my own tires isn't such a great idea, is it?

Any other suggestions, I am open to. But I may be checking the afore-mentioned-individual into a Tucson mental institution - that would a very novel excuse, and it would save me from telling a lie.