January 25, 2005 - Now that I am back in Cincinnati, I need to start healing up. The muscle over my rib cage on the right side has been causing me lots of pain, and it doesn't show signs of letting up. I got some medication prescribed from the doctor that is designed to stop the inflammation, but I keep forgetting to take it. I suspect it will just dull the pain more than anything, though. This is an interesting thought, though, because it seems that expectation plays a large part in my life. There are many times when I expected things to go a certain way and they turn out very different. I am usually pretty able to plan things out, to prepare myself for things, but when something unexpected happens, I have difficulty adapting immediately. Today I was expecting to see our bass player at practice but he wasn't there. I expected Lucas and Shawn and Josh to be interested and available to sing at the open mic this coming thursday but they weren't. These were pretty mild things, and I am not crushed by it, but it is not exactly what my expectation was. I am going to have to focus on learning to stop thinking ahead 10 moves in life and instead think laterally.